Salocin

Jarhead

While there has rarely been any shortage of people (especially from the film industry) claiming that war, and specifically the war in Iraq, is pointless, this story brings a new angle to that point of view.

We experience the war from the point of view of one particular marine, and while the purpose and success or failure of the US presence in Iraq as a whole is not dealt with, the pointlessness of this particular individual's presence in the war zone is keenly felt throughout the entire second half of the movie.

Jake Gyllenhaal plays Swoff, an ordinary individual who enlists into the marines, and quickly decides that he would rather be anywhere else. A fortuitous transfer brings him into an elite sniper's unit. Once there, the training, psychotic camaraderie and mind-numbing discipline quickly transform a group of 40 trainees into a squad of 8 professional snipers.

Saddam invades Kuwait and the marines are deployed. They originally believe the entire war will be over in a matter of days, but the situation quickly becomes a waiting game, as these expert snipers come to realise that when the air force is capable of destroying entire platoons with single strikes, there is little role for expert marksmen. Their presence in the desert appears to be a combination of pointlessness and public relations.

The narrative of this story has a powerful message about what we put enlisted soldiers through, the expectations that are set, the preparation their training gives them, and how those expectations are not met once they are deployed in battle. Their vision of what going into combat as highly-trained members of an elite fighting force quickly rubs up against the reality of waiting for six months in a sandy ditch, and the effects on their morale and their capabilities becomes quickly apparent.

The bravado and behaviour of the marines and their leadership, the gung ho "we are so righteous and unstoppable", and in particular the platoon commander's welcome speech given to the marines as they arrive on the ground in Kuwait, all serve to make us wonder what sort of creatures were sent there, ostensibly to represent us, including our interests and morals in the area, and the impression the locals were left with after they saw the behaviour of the armies of the west, both on the ground and on CNN.

The performances are good, and there's nothing wrong with the detail of the script, other than the occasional loss of momentum, but the basic premise of the movie is difficult to carry off. What, after all, is the point of a war movie which has as it's message the pointlessness it all? It's hard to make a point about pointlessness and keep the movie functioning within the parameters which make the audience walk away and feel either entertained or enlightened.

While no blame can be attributed to the makers of the film or the actors within it, the decision to make this book into a movie was misguided, because it just doesn't seem to work.