No Country For Old Men  | |
| The Darjeeling Limited | |
| Sicko | |
| Spider-Man 3 | |
| Manufacturing Dissent | |
| The Number 23 | |
 | Letters From Iwo Jima |
| Factory Girl | |
| Black Snake Moan | |
| PERFUME: THE STORY OF A MURDERER |
Letters From Iwo Jima Starring Ken Watanabe, Kazunari Ninomiya, Tsuyoshi Ihara, etc. Directed by Clint Eastwood Reviewed by Robert Ham  On a small island covered in rocky terrain and black sand, forces from the Japanese army are digging and plotting and fortifying themselves in preparation to stop the encroaching American forces. Despite the lack of support from the mainland, the destruction of the Imperial fleet that was to be their first line of defense, and horrible morale amongst the soldiers, the highest ranking officers are sure that the battle on Iwo Jima will be Japan's moment of military glory.Such is the scene set by Clint Eastwood in what is arguably one of his finest directorial efforts to date. Letters From Iwo Jima takes you into the world of these military men, showing both their internal and external struggles and using both voiceover (all featuring the actors reading actual letters from the soldiers who fought on the island) and flashback to devastating effect. Some of the scenes are matter of fact (General Kuribayashi, played by Ken Watanabe, sitting on a bench next to a busy American street sketching the bumper to bumper traffic), others imbued with tension and metaphoric intent (one soldier's downfall as a member of an elite Japanese guard), but all speak volumes about these men. The intent of the film is fairly obvious: to show the human side of a people who have, in most World War II movies, been shown strictly as the enemy, mostly in the guise of cold-hearted kamikaze types or bloodthirsty savages. To that end, Eastwood and his screenwriters (Paul Haggis & Iris Yamashita) do a fine job of expressing the fact that the Japanese soldiers were as patriotic, if not more so, than their American counterparts, and giving the tactical genius of the general in charge of the operation who dug out an elaborate series of connected caves that allowed the soldiers to fight from the shadows. Although masterfully directed, shot (the subdued, dark tones that cinematographer Tom Stern achieves are positively breathtaking), and edited, what hobbles the film is its inherent American-ness. Throughout the film, there's an overbearing sense of sentimentality that could only have come from the hands of a writer like Haggis (whose overwrought script for his directorial effort, Crash, inexplicably one him an Academy Award). One of the characters we are meant to follow throughout the course of the film is a bumbling infantryman named Saigo (serviceably performed by Kazunari Ninomiya). As the conscience of the film, Saigo is shown, in flashback, in a syrupy scene trying to calm his pregnant wife after they find out that he has been called to serve in the army. As they lie in bed together, Saigo whispers to his unborn child that he will “come back to him,” assuring the audience that at least one of the soldiers will make it out of the conflict alive. It is a glaring misstep when compared to the other flashbacks, which give the story its much-needed depth. Moments like those are mercifully few and far between in this film and are overshadowed by the harrowing battle sequences, the fine acting of the mostly Japanese cast, and the unshakeable mood of tension created by Eastwood and his camera. As he has shown so often in the past five years, he has a fantastic eye for setting a scene, allowing all the right details to set in, leaving you with moments that will stay burned into your mind's eye for weeks. |  |
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