The Thin Red Line

Starring Sean Penn, Adrien Brody, Ben Chaplin, Nick Nolte and Woody Harrelson

Review by Yair Oppenheim

There is a man who hasn't directed a movie in twenty years, and any actor familiar with his work is dying to have a spot in his films. His name is not George Lucas, but Terrence Malick. Mr Malick is well aware of this, yet it is this very self-conscious grandstanding effort that makes The Thin Red Line the success that it is. Before discussing the film, one issue should be addressed: Saving Private Ryan it is not. If one doesn't accept that upon viewing, it shouldn't pose a problem.

The film, though a lengthy three hours, gives surprisingly little emphasis to its plot. An Army rifle company is brought in to capture a key airfield in the Guadacanal region of the Pacific. The men are assigned to charge up a hill and decimate the enemy. This seemingly insignificant mission plays a role in the United States' victory over the Japanese. What happens to the region of Guadacanal, is portrayed by Terrence Malick, as of having little or no significance at all; it is merely used as a backdrop, not to tell an even greater story, but to express a deep, soulful thought. In other words, nothing happens in the film per se.

Yet, through perfect characterizations, a meaningful understanding is achieved amongst the characters and hopefully the audience, as these actors shed typical Hollywood cliches or simply take these hackneyed situations that have faced cinematic soldiers, and place them in their proper context.

The beginning of the film places the audience on an island, and from there shapes its message. Adrien Brody, though not exactly the main character, is the focus of this idea through the film. In his tour of duty, he searches for an answer: Why is man dual natured? Why does he seek peace, yet make war? The thoughts presented in the film are accompanied by gorgeous cinematography. The film's cinematographer, John Toll, won Academy awards for his work in Braveheart and Legends of the Fall, and does a superb job in capturing the feel of a foreign environment that can be as poisonous as it is pleasurable. It gives the film a timeless quality, so the film can remain a contemporary view of war as long as war exists.

As this theme hangs over the film, another is introduced. The tagline of the film best presents it: Every man fights his own war. One of the characters in the film explains how each soldier must hang on to some image or memory, and make it an island for himself in order to survive. That's what keeps the men alive.

This concept is shown over every character, and in uncanny detail that should only prove Malick's brilliance as the film's director and writer (the film was adapted off a James Jones novel of the same name). The majority of the actors speak in soliloquy, one of the many artistic merits that may alienate the audience. Malick has used this approach in his last film, Days of Heaven. It is through this that we bounce from one character to the other, and see how many opposing viewpoints of morality in a war can both be right.

These characters are detailed to as near a human degree as possible for fiction. There are not simply cowards or jokers or psychos like in Saving Private Ryan; these people are not two-dimensional caricatures that make up any military unit in the timeless Hollywood epoch. Here we see people that keep losing friends and can't react to it emotionally (an excellent performance by Sean Penn), leaders who relieve commanders of duty, not because they get burnt out and try to save the lives of soldiers, but because they break the unity of the group; they halt progress (seen in an Oscar-worthy performance by Nick Nolte). These characters obviously express familiar emotions, but in this film, which will most likely be the only truly poetic war film ever made, we are privy to the characters motivations that make him feel the way he does.

This innovation of the war film strikes as an instant classic. Every other war film loses characterization by forcefully meandering through a plot. Here, the director sheds these "inhibitions" and lets characters shine. An example of this type of direction in conjunction with the grasping of hope is best exemplified in one scene: One of the characters gets a letter from his wife, which says she is leaving him. This very soldier who volunteered for a dangerous reconnasaince mission can't get a hold of himself emotionally. A few scenes later, a commander looks for volunteers. We glimpse his face. He doesn't join the group.

Moviegoers who pass these keys scenes which form a patchwork of the human mind will write off the film as empty and unfullfilling. Hopefully, people who spend the time to enjoy mindbending films - films like the classics that Stanley Kubrick made, will grasp the thought-provoking brilliance that is The Thin Red Line.