Flags of Our Fathers

Watched "Flags of Our Fathers" with dan and zq today. One conclusion: I did not come out feeling exceptionally poignant or affected by the movie. So much for it being a "brilliant and evocative" movie. Could it be my nonchalance or that the movie just did not give enough?

I should think the movie shortchanged me. There was insufficient footage of the evocative scenes. However when they tried to get the point of Indian discrimination thru, it seemed too contrived. Out of nowhere, I saw the Indian protagonist wielding a chair and flinging it at policemen. There was hardly any development on that event before demonstrating the point.

Also the characterisation was not very well-rounded. Most characterisation was on the three protagonists and not on the true "heroes" who rose the flag first. At least they showed the scenes that made the protagonists famous,unwittingly.

One last point that really tested my patience was the toggling of scenes between past and present. It did not confuse me but I was irritated by it. It was definitely the director's way of getting the point thru but somehow I was turned off after a while. He overused the scene toggling method..

However despite all these loopholes, the movie got a 3.5 from me. I admit I am biased towards war movies and they normally get more points from me, but nonetheless, a truthful movie to know what really happened at the Battle of Iwojima (at least tts what I think), coupled with true accounts of the dubbed heroes.

One thing I learnt from this, war can be a real political scam. "Hero" is a term coined by our imaginations.