Category: Tom McCarthy

FLAGS OF OUR FATHERS

By Marc S. Sanders

Arguably the most famous photograph in American history is that of the six soldiers raising the flag on the island of Iwo Jima while battling Japanese forces during World War II.  I remain fascinated by the image.  

I recall visiting the landmark statue in Washington DC when I was traveling by myself.  I took countless pictures of the piece.  I got close ups, wide lens shots, pictures of the flag and pictures of each sculpted soldier.  It’s heroic in any aspect.  It looks like something out of a Superman comic book.  As it turns out, the famed image was just a happy accident during a violently terrible time in twentieth century history.  Photographer Joe Rosenthal didn’t even realize what his camera captured until his film was later developed.  Turned out this was the second attempt at raising the flag.  Furthermore, this occurred on the fifth day of the conflict – with thirty-five days still to go before the Americans could claim victory over the bloody crisis.

So, while Rosenthal’s image seems to declare American patriotism at its finest, the real story is not as romantic.  In fact, one of the narrators of Clint Eastwood’s film, Flags Of Our Fathers, suggests that there are no heroes to celebrate.  Whoever the men in that picture were, they were not so much fighting for their country as they were trying to stay alive and look after the comrades ahead and behind them.

Flags Of Our Fathers has a very reminiscent feel to producer Steven Spielberg’s Saving Private Ryan with unforgiving battle scenes of blood, death, bombings and young soldiers storming a beach while screaming for their buddies.  Spielberg might have impressed me first, but Clint Eastwood masterfully shoots wide landscapes and up-close turmoil with his reliable strategies of shooting in shadows and silohouettes.  Eastwood’s film, scripted by Paul Haggis and William Broyles Jr veers into a unique direction though as Rosenthal’s picture takes on a life of its own back in the states.  It makes the front page of every paper.  Harry Truman stands proud of it along with all the decorated military leaders.

Now that America has entered the war, it is appropriate to ignite a propaganda campaign.  This picture of the Stars and Stripes getting elevated into the sobering, smoky war-torn skies will motivate citizens to buy war bonds to further fund the war effort.  The spokesmen will be the ones believed to be the remaining surviving three of the six in that image.  Ryan Phillipe is Navy enlisted John “Doc” Bradley.  Jesse Bradford is Rene Gagon, and Adam Beach plays Native American Ira Hayes, both of the Marine Corps.

I believe Flags Of Our Fathers embraces what every enlisted person did to serve the efforts of America during the war, and the picture mourns the countless sacrifices and losses that occurred.  However, it frowns upon the domestic response to what really went on overseas.  Those that returned carried terrible and unforgettable trauma based on their experiences.  Yet, the three thought to be part of the flag raising were pushed to celebrate their achievements summed up in a split-second image.  Bradley, Gagon and Hayes were skeptical if they were the ones in that picture.  Government Bureaucrats could care less.   There were others on that hill who cannot speak for themselves, but officials in suits and ties will insist otherwise to uphold a countrywide tour complete with recreations of the hill they ran up on that fateful day.  Even desserts are crafted like the famed image.

Ira Hayes is the one who is especially conflicted with his new responsibilities to the governing body that historically acquired his ancestors’ territory.  Adam Beach portrays a torn individual who is limited in celebration by the United States and certainly patronized.  Who he stems from does not matter.  He represents a false interpretation of the English acceptance of his Native heritage.  His obligation to this machine of propaganda only doubles the exaggeration that his other two peers are coerced to parade with marching bands and fireworks.  All that the ongoing extravagance does is keep him absorbed in the Japanese lives he brutally slaughtered and the bloodshed that surrounded him.  It’s a heartbreaking performance told with an absence of true appreciation for what Hayes gave up on that battlefield.

I learned much from Flags Of Our Fathers, but I had issues with comprehending everything.  While the immense war footage is chaotic with sharp editing and camerawork, it’s challenging to match names with faces in the picture.  There are two elderly men who are recounting what occurred and what happened to these men and their families long after the incident was over.  It was hard for me to line up which older man was who, on top of who they are talking about at times.  Paul Walker is one famous face in the crowd.  So is Barry Pepper but I could not identify the names of their characters until the film was arriving at its conclusion.  It was not until the epilogue of the movie arrives that it became a little clearer.  I also had to later reference what is listed on IMDB.  

The entire design of Eastwood’s movie is authentic from the battles staged for the Iwo Jima conflict to what mid-1940s domestic life looked like back home.  Truly absorbing while both storylines seem so different.  Clint Eastwood also wrote the soundtrack composition, and it is truly sobering.  His son Kyle performs with the orchestra.  

Flags Of Our Fathers partnered with Clint Eastwood’s follow up later in the year, Letters From Iwo Jima, which offered the Japanese perspective of the incident.  Bridge the films together and you get an incredible cinematic experience.  So many war pictures are one sided.  In all fairness, most movies do not have the time, luxury or finances to expand their palettes from one side to the other.  Because these two films are companion pieces, the viewer gets a fair account of how this battle, located on a tiny island, treated the men on the ground while their governing bodies celebrated their stands for patriotism, victory and monetary funding.

Eastwood demonstrates that the war destroyed practically everyone who was engaged in it regardless of the countries these soldiers served.  Many were slaughtered, but the innocence of those that physically survived died with everyone else during this period of time.  Clint Eastwood directed two films that explain this never-ending atrocity.  These men eventually laid down their weapons, but they never left the war.

MEET THE PARENTS

By Marc S. Sanders

Am I the only one who used to get tired of feeling sorry for Ben Stiller?  The go to formulas of his earlier comedies made him the unfortunate stooge.  The best of that batch was The Farrelly Brothers’ hilarious There’s Something About Mary.  Every gag, every cast member, every storyline was straight up side splitting.  Late last year, during the hurricane chaos in Florida I got around to watching Along Came Polly.  Poor Ben had to play basketball defense against a bare chested wookie hairball of a guy and his close up of misfortune carried the advertising campaign for that movie. 

Back in the year 2000, Stiller suffered through a terrible weekend with an intimidating Robert DeNiro frowning on his every move in Meet The Parents, also known as the first of a “Fockers Trilogy.”  Yeah, Meet The Parents is funny.  You shake your head at the absurd comedy that befalls Stiller’s character, Greg Focker. Though that isn’t even his real name at birthright.  Still, I can’t recall feeling so guilty for one guy’s misfortune that he can hardly ever help to avoid.  This guy is destined to never win, to never overcome, to never live without self-consciousness.

Greg Focker is ready to propose to his loving girlfriend Pam Burns (Teri Polo). First, he has to survive a weekend at her parents’ house where the other daughter is getting married.  Not so easy because first the airline loses his luggage and poor Greg has no clothes to wear, other than what Pam’s pot head brother can provide. Baggy jeans and baggy sweatshirt on a short and svelte Ben Stiller is one sight gag of many.  The guy also has to nonchalantly dismiss his uninviting surname and the fact that Pam’s father Jack (DeNiro) is unimpressed with his occupation.  Greg is not a nurse.  Greg is “a male nurse,” who opted not to go all the way for the MD, even after taking the exams. 

Jack and his wife Dina (Blythe Danner) are less than impressed with Greg’s housewarming gift.  Jack’s precious cat Mr. Jinx is a bit of a problem because Pam can’t keep her mouth shut that Greg is not fond of cats.  Doesn’t make him a bad guy, but does her cat loving father need to know this interesting tid bit, right away?  Pam’s ex-boyfriend Kevin (a hilarious Owen Wilson against Stiller’s pitiful expressions) can do absolutely no wrong – like nothing at all.  The biggest challenge for Greg though is Jack.  Whether it’s Taxi Driver or Meet The Parents or Rocky & Bullwinkle, Robert DeNiro is the embodiment of intimidation. 

Meet The Parents is funny, and it serves no purpose to surrender the many sight gags or one liners that are offered in the film.  I laugh.  I laugh hard when I watch this movie, but I hardly ever feel good about myself.  Poor Greg never catches a break.  He’s in a no-win situation and I’m just uneasy about the whole thing.  The guy chooses not to go swimming because he has no swimsuit. Then Kevin offers one and well…yeah…I’m on Greg’s side and it’s not funny for Greg.  If I was a guest in someone’s home only to wake up late when the whole family is dressed and finishing breakfast, and I’m wearing my girlfriend’s dad’s PJs, of course I’m going to feel insecure.  For the sake of the comedy in Meet The Parents, the set ups are simply awkward situations to laugh at that one guy in the room.  Poor Greg.  Poor, poor Greg. 

In fact, the real villain of Meet The Parents is not even DeNiro’s Jack Burns who has some secrets to hide.  Actually, the unsympathizing bad guy is Teri Polo’s character.  Pam never makes it easy for her boyfriend.  Greg rightfully asks why didn’t she wake him up or why didn’t she tell him her dad is not a florist, or why this and why that, and Pam is naïve to Greg’s justified concern, never empathizing with his position.  In fact, when he tries to explain his feelings, she’s nothing but insensitively dismissive. 

Yes.  It’s a comedy, but I was begging and begging and BEGGING Greg to just leave.  Leave this place.  LEAVE PAM FOR GOOD AND GET OUT OF THIS HOUSE.  You know, like we would tell the counselors in a Friday The 13th flick?  It’s not so much the father as it is his girlfriend who quickly nosedives Greg’s comfort into an inescapable hell.  You know how people love to say Jenny is the villain of Forrest Gump?  Well, I got one better.  Pam Burns is an unthoughtful, uncaring, spoiled brat of a daddy’s girl with nary a shred of consideration for others. 

I despise you Pam Burns – daughter of Jack and Dina Burns, rotten and heartless girlfriend to Greg Focker!!!!! 

SPOTLIGHT

By Marc S. Sanders

It’s tough to be a fair journalist when a higher power carries great influence over the what and how of honest reporting. In Tom McCarthy’s Best Picture Oscar winner, Spotlight, it’s not so much the crimes of child molestation by the hands of priests from the Boston Archdiocese that are so important. Rather, it is how the facts are suppressed and the pressure to contain the truth are so apparent. Maybe it finally took the will of a new editor, a Jewish editor from New York, named Marty Baron (Liev Schrieber), at the esteemed Boston Globe newspaper to get the special section crew known as Spotlight to work on how case after case of reported child molestation incidents were allowed to occur for decades under the eye of the highest powers in the church.

First, it’s important to note how easy it is for a priest to seduce a young boy. He welcomes the boy for special duties within the church. Then the priest and child may share a dirty joke together. Just their little secret. After that, touching occurs which leads to unimaginable and irreversible damage. Yet, the grown man once considered that special attention he received as a direct link to God himself. McCarthy deliberately repeats that viewpoint from more than one victim in the film; it was as if God had selected them for special attention and God was especially speaking to them. None of this could be more patterned.

Marty Baron counts on his team to not only collect the mounting number of cases. He tells them to uncover an even worse truth and that is the systemic response the church upheld where when a new case comes to light, a deal is worked with a pawn for an attorney to give settlement hush money while the priest in question will take sick leave or simply be reassigned to another church location free to do God’s will while also committing his own willing nature.

The Spotlight team consists of Mark Ruffalo and Rachel McAdams as well as Michael Keaton. All of their true to life characters were born and raised in Boston. Some under Catholic influence. So the conflict for them to do their jobs ethically and morally is challenging when faced with literally going up against the one institution that seems to own the city of Boston without it showing on paper necessarily. It also means coming to disheartening terms with their own upbringing.

To convincingly depict the grasp the church has on the politicians and newspapers in the area, McCarthy shoots a lot of his talking scenes outdoors on public benches and sidewalks. Therefore, you get an almost claustrophobic shadow of how close the Catholic Church is to the city’s residents. If a scene is at a dinner party or cocktail hour, a man of the cloth is nearby. A sidewalk stroll between a victim and a reporter seems to tread carefully. You never know if that cathedral on the corner is listening. Spotlight is primarily a journalism film of the highest standard. The pursuit for the truth is ripe with the obstacles of slamming doors when trying to get a statement or dealing with the unfair reveal of no records that legally are meant to be public. There’s a race to get the whole truth before a competing media outlet grabs it and misconstrues it. As well, what happens when a bigger story suddenly takes precedence and this story must be put on hold. I mean how do you not drop everything to report on 9/11?

Spotlight is another important film as it does not compromise in its true to life storytelling. It’s unfathomable to believe that men of God could use their positions to take advantage of the innocence of children and then refuse to accept responsibility for it. Even worse is the egregious actions taken to modify the authority of local law enforcement and judicial objectivity that should be there to protect the rights of these victims.

Tom McCarthy’s piece is excellent with a cast in top form. It would have to be as the screenplay is peppered with conversation after conversation. This is a newspaper film. So therefore it’s a talky piece. You get passionate monologues from Ruffalo who does not hold back his anger and disgust at what he uncovers with an acerbic but crusading attorney played beautifully by Stanley Tucci. This attorney has lost every battle he’s had with the church but he does not give up on his client victims either. He’s their only protector in an arena of powerful criminals who hide behind scripture.

You also have a real go-getter reporter in Rachel McAdams. McCarthy repeatedly shoots her from behind walking the streets of Boston with a pad and pen as she meets a victim or simply knocks on neighboring doors for some facts. Her challenge is seeking the truth while her grandmother holds an undying faith in religion of Catholicism by visiting the church at least three times a week. A crushing, albeit brief, scene occurs near the end of the film when the reporter’s grandmother reads her final story in the Spotlight section.

Michael Keaton is the Irish Bostonian rooted in tradition. He knows all the important people in the city. He knows Cardinal Law who runs the church and he holds on to his journalistic code of fact collecting for as long as he can muster.

The truth and web of lies and deceit could never really shock me in Spotlight. I’ve heard it all before. Instead, it’s the knowing acts of concealing horrifying sin. Ironically, those actions are committed by those that listen to the confessions of its sinful disciples. As I’m of an age where I question the validity and need for religion in our upbringing, I can’t help but wonder how these victims would have turned out had religion never became a factor in their lives. These children, now men, went on to commit suicide, become chemical dependent, and occasionally became child molesters themselves. It’s easy to argue that these conditions were never part of their chemical make up. It’s also easy to argue that the Catholic Church carelessly determined the destinies of these men without any regard for being accountable of the damaging results. Spotlight confidentially reaffirms both of these arguments.