I just saw the movie Hurt Locker and I’ve noticed something peculiar about the reviews. By and large, the lion’s share of the bad reviews are given by veterans. On the flip side, the reviews that praise the movie to high Heaven come from those who are not veterans. I don’t make the distinction to put a spot light on useful criteria for judging movies to be good or bad. But it is an interesting distinction. Veterans, for the most part, couldn’t swallow the movie. The movie is - and ought to be - pigeonholed as a war movie, but it says farewell to the John Wayne-type war movie. It’s pitched as a movie depicting things ‘as they really are’.
It moves away from the symbolism and art and harrowing character studies of Apocalypse Now, and further away from the sprawling Deer Hunter, checkered with big-wig Hollywood heavyweights. Hurt Locker fell more into the category of a Saving Private Ryan set in modern day Iraq, without the melodrama. You could almost put it on par with Platoon. All the same, Platoon dealt with the turmoil of betrayal and rivalry in a group (a microcosm of the Vietnam situation as a whole), and Hurt Locker deals with a character who uses the war like a drug. In fact, he has used to the drug so much, it’s hard for him to get a high anymore.
The movie focuses on an expert bomb defuser, his puzzling stoic nature, his friction with his comrades, his vigilantism, and just the horrifying flavor of war in general. As to my own experience, I wasn’t drawn to the character. My gut told me the character just didn’t exist; for all that, I would have accepted it in another context. But here, he struck a discordant note against the seeming realism. In a movie like Apocalypse Now, more an allegory about evil and human nature than war in general, I could swallow Duvall’s bravado in the midst of falling bombs. His was a character representing a symbol of a certain type of soldier, itself an element in understanding the entirety of the allegory. But if Duvall’s character had been in Saving Private Ryan or Deer Hunter, it would have been an artistic gaffe. The apples and oranges need to stay in their own baskets.
This is the error I see Hurt Locker responsible for. William James (Renner) is a character that doesn’t ring true. The macho nonsense and bombast just aggravated me. Lines like: “If I’m going to die, I might as well do it comfortably.” Or: the scene when he blocks his view from his comrades out of some twisted aim to look like this silly renegade. Or: when he called his ex-wife and son, and said nothing - tiresome. Or: the overdone ‘crouch in shower scene with all your clothes and kick around in frustration’ scene - uninspired. As art, I couldn’t stomach it. I tried! The praise heaped on this movie has been enormous. My idol-critic Roger Ebert has endorsed it with an enthusiastic 4-star rating.
Ebert likes Renner’s character. To each his own. I’m not denying the movie had suspenseful scenes. I especially felt unnerved during the sniper battle, but when was I supposed to be unnerved with the scene involving the bombs in the car’s trunk, I was again distracted by a lack of realism. Why not just get everyone out of there and bomb the car to smithereens? Why risk Renner’s life? Why the middle finger when given a direct order to back away from certain death, at least a certain death that would have been felt by a normal human being in a real war? Ebert says there is no gung ho in the movie. Really? That seemed to embody Renner’s character. The character Sanborn was the realist in the movie I guess we’re supposed to side with, but then all the interchanges between him and Renner weren’t realistic. I think they needed to be for this movie to be a success.
I say all this tentatively, because I want to trust the reviews over my own sentiment. I know when I like a movie, and I can tell pretty clearly when that’s going to happen. But my experience watching this movie was exasperating, having a larger-than-life character in a movie that’s supposed to be representing the real thing. It would be like having the skeletal Tyrannosaurus Rex from Night at the Museum make an appearance on Jurassic Park. So, I am open to correction from anyone who thinks I judged this movie unfairly!
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To each his own.
ReplyDeleteStrong review, I understand the disconnect, I may have "felt" it also: I still loved it!
Is he larger than life? He could be. I am not sure that I am surprised to find a "type A" personality in ordinance disposal.
I didn't view James' acts as being "macho", I saw it as brash: a man beyond fear. A wolf in its element,beyond the pasture slaughtering sheep; instead, stalking the game. Doing the only thing that God made him to do. So I don't see the smoke as a macho act; I see it as a simple attempt to stop the hen pecking.
So, to each his own.
Note that James did not ignore a direct order: superiors are not ordered about by their inferiors.
Thanks for that correction. I thought James was outranked by Sanborn. It's strange though: James was called a Staff Sergeant at one point (an E-6), but his rank shows him to be a Sergeant First Class (an E-7). It's doesn't matter, though: he still outranks Sanborn. I guess you could turn my complaint around: why is a Sanborn (E-5) giving orders to James (E-7)?
ReplyDeleteAgree to disagree on James: maybe on repeated viewings, I'll be swayed over to your side. I see your Type-A personality point, but I felt it to be a bit too amplified. I think I jumped on the word 'macho' (but excessively brash will work too!) because of that scene where they're drunk, exchanging blows in their bunker, and when James draws the circle on his stomach as a target for where he wants Sanborn it hit him. All of that felt way to self-conscious to me, like it wasn't subtle enough for me. Something didn't feel intact; it was too staged.
Another part of me just wants to admit the possibility of the personality. I mean: it's possible! Either way, I just don't have the desire to encounter it again.
I also heard EOD don't train to be snipers; that's just the special forces. That was disappointing. Is that true?
I don't think that they train to be snipers, I guess that would explain why they were such awful shots! I mean horrible, then again, they are soldiers and not Marines. :o)
ReplyDeleteAs far as the ordering one another around, Sanborn: (1) could be in a superior position via billet and not rank, or (2) could have been scared that he was about to be blown-up and reacted with faux authority. I believed it was the latter explanation while watching the movie.
As far as the fighting in the barracks goes, that type of horse play occurs all-the-time; that said, it was a bit over the top; however, what about "Platoon"s smoking the joints out of the barrels of the rifles? Did that scene ruin the movie for you?
I wonder if I can set this up where I can get an email notification when I get a comment. I just saw this! lol
ReplyDeleteYes. Marines would have blown everyone away! No doubt.
I opt for 2, as well.
As for Platoon: My gut doesn't wrench at that scene, which is just a testimony to my own sentiments, a subjective criterion. For me (also), Platoon is surrounded by a certain mystique, and it sometimes makes it harder to critque or be objective with that sort of movie. The grainy image, its status as a war epic, its winning Best Picture, its establishing Oliver Stone as a great director, all make certain scenes easier to forgive. Today's movies have to work without that mystique: and when they have to get over the obstacle of 'not ringing true', the contemporary scene has more to deal with. This is unfair, I know.
But in terms of realism, smoking joints out of rifle barrels didn't strike me as being out of the question or preposterous. This might be because that scene is an element in the whole mythology of The Vietnam War that already exists in my imagination. In real life, I'd think the macho scene in Hurt Locker - if I were really there - to be stupid, and that's why I have an aversion to it when I see it in a movie: and Hurt Locker doesn't have the luxury of having a mythology to appeal to - at least, not yet. I just can't be entertained by it, or something. But like I said, this is all perilously subjective! And, in any case, all this was just an explanation for the word-choice of 'macho'.