Clint Eastwood #2: Letters from Iwo Jima

Whatever it may be, Clint Eastwood's Letters from Iwo Jima does not feel so much like a war film. It does cover war, and it shows the brutality of the fighting that occurred over the 35 days that it took before the island of Iwo Jima was cleared by American forces. But it plays out differently, looking from the Japanese perspective at the men who fought on the island, showing their personal histories and experiences, and showing the mental struggle over what they were fighting for and what they were fighting against.

Like with Million Dollar Baby, Eastwood seems to cover the story the film portrays through a series of episodes that form the scenes of the movie, each of them advancing the plot or expanding on characters' stories or identities. This is sort of true for any director, but he doesn't cut time up during these periods or skip over anything. In short, you could say that his style is the anti-montage-sequence. Everything is shown in substantial chunks of real time, and it jumps the gaps in between, hitting the important bits of the story. As a result, some of the transitions and jumps feel abrupt or disconnected, but within a given scene, it works well to get the viewer involved in the moment and to take the point of view of the people involved.

This organization also makes sense because the scenes that appear seem closely chosen to expand on the characters. The connections that several characters have to their homes are shown, through flashbacks tied to letters that they read and write. There are plenty of scenes in which characters question why they are fighting, and ponder what will happen to them. The 'why' question and its tension peak when a wounded American soldier is taken. The Japanese colonel orders him cared for, before talking to him and revealing that he had spent time in America himself. The soldier dies from his wounds, though, and the colonel reads a letter that his mother had sent him. The letter connects his experience to that of the Japanese soldiers, whose own letters had held such similar messages, making them question what they have heard about the enemy. It takes only seconds after hearing the letter before their thoughts are disturbed by the explosion of enemy fire, and harsh reality takes over once more.

The film's episodes show moments of hard decision in war, and frame the tensions that drove the war effort. One example is when the protagonist Saigo and another private decide to keep fighting instead of following their captain and committing seppuku with grenades. Mirroring scenes show American and Japanese soldiers who choose to kill hopeless enemy soldiers instead of taking prisoners. An elite soldier explains how he was sent to Iwo Jima as punishment after refusing to kill a civilian's dog as a show of obedience. These scenes show how each individual follows a different course under the threat of war, and reveals his true colors in the process. In taking the perspective of the side that was isolated, outnumbered, and hopeless in the long run of the battle, the film shows the full force of war and sends the message home: that war really sucks.