There are scenes where this film hits the high notes that it is aiming
for. When it actually channels a bit of the genius that it intends
to show.
However, there are just not quite enough of them for me to recommend
this film.
War movies are a strange little genre unto themselves. And they often
hit the same points over and over again. Not that there is anything
wrong with that. They are good points: the tragedy, brutality and
ultimate pointlessness of war; the waste of human life; the loss of
innocence and youth. These are all relevant themes and "The Thin
Red Line" means to tackle them. It does so with varying degrees
of success.
On one hand, we have a superb performance by Nick Nolte as a hardened
general who will let nothing, absolutely nothing, stand in the way
of his success. He has been given his orders. He has his agenda and he
means to follow it through, no matter what the cost.
Opposing him is Elias Koteas, known best to those of my generation
as Casey Jones (the guy in the hockey mask) from the Teenage Mutant
Ninja Turtles movies. He is equally good as a man who argues for his
troops. He disobeys Nolte's orders when he finds it necessary, seeing
no reason to sacrifice his men for something pointless and in a fight
that they cannot possibly win. The struggle between these two men
says a great deal about the nature of war, and it is a very important
statement. Whenever the film chooses to focus on these two men, it
is fascinating.
There are other things of note in this film as well. The subplot in
which a man stays true to his wife no matter what was of great interest
to me. She is the thing that gets him through the war, the single
thing that keeps him going. Then he gets a shattering piece of news
that I will not reveal to you here. Needless to say, that is a powerful
moment.
There are powerful moments here, just not enough of them for me to
recommend the film. For one thing, it is too unfocused. Characters appear and disappear
without a point and without an explanation. The narrative rambles
and without reason. The ending of the film is decidedly anticlimactic.
Not only that, but the first forty-five minutes or so of this film
are just not interesting. They are downright boring, in fact. I sat
there waiting for the film to take off, to lead somewhere interesting.
And it eventually did go somewhere interesting. It has some very good
points to make at times. I just think that the first hour seriously
undermines the remainder of the film. It is a lag that the best moments
of the movie never quite recover from.
Another quibble I had with the movie was that there were far too many
big stars in it, and for short amounts of time. We don't get to know
them. They don't really serve the plot much of the time. Instead,
they distract one from the rest of the movie. You follow along and
just when the film is starting to absorb you, you think "Hey,
there's John Travolta!" He shows up, says a few lines, distracts
your mind from whatever else might be going on onscreen, and then
he disappears just as suddenly and inexplicably as he came. He is
not alone on this. Many other stars do the same. They show up just
long enough to throw off your attention and then are gone before you
can figure out what they were doing there.
The scenery is beautiful, and there are many mesmerizing shots involved
in this film. But ultimately, this viewer was left wanting. I wanted
to see more of what happened to the characters that I was made to
care about. I wanted the movie to concentrate more on them and less
on the major stars that seem to arrive simply for cameos. I wanted
it to delve deeper, to toy more with both its issues and my emotions.
But in the end, I was left wanting more than the film itself would
provide.
For some, "The Thin Red Line" may be a fascinating and absorbing
study of war. And for those who find it to be such, I am happy. More
power to them. I only wish I had felt the same way.
For me, however, "The Thin Red Line" was a rather maddening
experience.
