Flags Of Our Fathers

Just last week I received Flags Of Our Fathers in the mail. I got the edited version of the film, and they took out about 15 or so minutes of footage at least. And still the movie's a solid 2 hours long, and still it is an absolute masterpiece, surpassing its companion, Letters From Iwo Jima in storytelling. The Flags book (youth version) is probably my favorite book, and I am currently reading it for the second time. It is powerful and endearing. The movie is the same. It is told in flashback from the perspectives of the 3 raisers of the American flag above Mount Suribachi in that ever-popular picture that has become a symbol of valor. As the book and movie show, however, the raising of the flag was barely noticed by those on the island. It was the second flag raised; it replaced the first one, which was taken by an officer as a souvenir. The first flag raising had been cheered on the island and on ships offshore. The second flag was barely noticed, as fighting on the other side of the island continued to rage, and the battle of Iwo continued for 35 days, resulting in the deaths of 3 of the 6 flag raisers.

The movie perfectly mixes the amounts of drama and action. Every time the story begins to drag there is a flashback to the battle of Iwo. The battles are expertly filmed. The coloring is outstanding, and it alone makes the film enjoyable to watch.

Flags is every bit as tragic as Letters, as well. The stories of the three surviving flag raisers, particularly the story of Pima Indian Ira Hayes, are quite sad. The characters are very real. Although others disagree, I felt that the acting was quite good and the characters were very 3-dimensional and easy to believe and feel for, at least the majority of the time.

The only thing I did not like was the underdevelopment of the other 3 flag raisers. However, this was inevitable, as there was already a ton of story to tell about the 3 flag raisers the movie focused on. If you want to really get to know the flag raisers, read the book (the youth version; the adult version contains a lot of profanity). Also, the ending of the movie is a bit drawn out, but the final shots really make up for that and are very powerful in a unique way.

I have seen edited versions of Saving Private Ryan, Black Hawk Down, Saints and Soldiers, and an un-edited version of Letters From Iwo Jima. Flags Of Our Fathers is the best of these, followed closely by Saints. Of course, they are all very good and very powerful, and I enjoy each one immensely, but Flags was simply the most powerful.

It's just too bad I've had to see edited versions of most of these films. Not one swear word added anything to any of them. It was all completely unnecessary. Flags has over 100 curse words - all unnecessary. The writer for the film is Paul Haggis, who previously wrote and directed Crash, which pretty much explains why Flags has so much language. To be quite honest, I feel language is a sign of unintelligent writing. If you can't think of a way to better display emotions than having your character drop an F-bomb, that is a lack of good storytelling. And it's not all "realistic." Not every soldier cussed. In the Flags book, the writer, James Bradley, son of flag raiser Doc Bradley, states that the one thing his mom liked about his dad was that he didn't swear. In the movie, of course, he swears several times, and not always in battle, either. After coming back to America, he still uses the F-word - in public. Back then, you simply didn't swear in public. That's pretty unrealistic, if you ask me. And not every soldier swore. In Flags, pretty much every character cusses at least once.

Thankfully, I got to see the edited version, which muted out the cuss words. I would have preferred that this company did the same as the company I used to buy edited movies from, and cut out the word completely, but at least I didn't have to hear all that bad language.

In all, I give Flags Of Our Fathers a 9 out of 10, ranking it just behind The Lord Of The Rings Trilogy, which I give 10 out of 10. If you can see it edited, do it. It's a great movie.

God bless!

Geno

Note: Just wanted to let everyone know, I had to use a couple TV spots rather than the trailer, because the trailer has a cuss word in it.