Flags of Our Fathers
Flat and maudlin at the same time, Clint Eastwood’s “Flags of Our Fathers” packages bromides about the nature of heroism within a meandering and incoherent narrative. Eastwood and his screenwriters, William Broyles Jr. and Paul Haggis, bring neither insight nor lucidity to a complex subject. “Flags of Our Fathers” examines the fallout from the iconic photograph of the flag-raising at Iwo Jima. Only three of the six soldiers in the photo survived the battle, and they were trotted out on a demeaning P.R. tour to help sell war bonds while the fighting in the Pacific raged on. The propaganda machine is toughest on Ira Hayes, an American Indian played bravely by Adam Beach, who’s plied with booze he can’t handle and confronted with racism both casual and overt. His scenes are the strongest in the movie, yet the overemphatic Eastwood wants to make sure you know exactly how you’re supposed to feel. And he undermines Beach and the rest of his actors by mincing the story into mush. For no apparent reason, Eastwood obscures the identities of his multiple voice-over narrators, and he’s equally inept at establishing distinct characters in the theater of war. Gritty as they are, the disconnected battle scenes start to feel like filler. No one who doesn’t survive makes much of an impression – the opposite of the movie’s intent. When Ira breaks down, talking about a heroic Marine named Mike, I honestly had no idea who Mike was. The Greatest Generation deserves far better than “Flags of Our Fathers.”
LISTEN: Flags of Our Fathers