November 2005

Sam Mendes (American Beauty, The Road to Perdition) directs Jake Gyllenhaal (Donnie Darko, Brokeback Mountain) in this adaptaion of Anthony Swofford’s excellent bio, Jarhead.  A war movie without a war, Jarhead’s excellent cast and great cinematography save this film from being a waste of time, but you’ll find yourself playing ‘what war movie was that from’ quite a bit in between the good bits.  Whether Mendes is adrift in a film that lacks an internal life for it’s lead, or whether he’s unable to find a cinematic language to fill in for Swafford’s astoundingly good (and unfilmable) prose, Jarhead is yet another movie where one is left with a ‘what was the point of that’ feeling. 

Jarhead
3 & 1/2 Stars

The first Gulf War seems an unlikely topic for cinematic review, as nothing much happened that could carry a traditional war film.  David O. Russell’s excellent Three Kings pulled it off by using the conflict to jump into a heist film, and a black comedy, but Sam Mendes’ latest effort, Jarhead, seems unable to tread any ground that hasn’t already been paved.  I remember my first reaction to hearing that Anthony Swofford’s Marine life memoir was being given the Hollywood treatment being roughly ‘How the hell are they going to make that book into a movie?”, but I’m sad to say that neither myself of Mendes seemed to come up with a good answer to that.

An almost ridiculously buff Jake Gyllenhaal takes on the role of Swoff, a young, bright individual that inexplicitly makes the decision to join the Marine Corps; an act which eventually lands him in Kuwait as a sniper in a conflict fought more with heavy artillery.  His squadmates are a collection of barely functioning time bombs, his staff seargant (Jamie Foxx in that most trite of roles: the gruff leader) is somewhere between his mentor and his tormentor, and all Swoff can think about is either killing some Iraqis, or his faraway girlfriend, who may or may not be cheating on him.  Needless to say, the waiting game of war and the surrealness of military life combine to unsettle Swoff to the point of near madness.

For a film whose trailer is chock full of explosions and guns, 99% of Jarhead is simply an account of the minutiae and infinite bordedom that fills the life of a soldier deployed in a conflict that has no use for him.  While that might make for an interesting study of a man, ultimately we’re locked out of Swoff’s life and internal process.  A suprising result, considering the flashbacks and narration that pepper the film.  At the end of it’s running time, we know no more about Gyllenhaal’s character than we did in the beginning beyond the anecedotal details of various moments of his life.  He’s a closed book, leaving us to scratch our heads in bewilderment over his oscillations from smart-ass slacker, to blood thirsty killer, to suicidal loon, and back again.  While his body is ridiculously buff (a fact not unexplored by the film;  He’s half naked for goodly chunks of it, and full-on frontal naked for a scene), Gyllenhaal’s boyish face and deep-set eyes hide his internal process from curious on-lookers. 

Peter Sarsgaard (another facial cipher) has what should be the more interesting role as a quietly dignified man defined by an organization that doesn’t want him, but he’s given only a single scene in which to shine (and shine he does).  The rest of the cast is an interchangable mix of war movie stereotypes which, while a little trite, probably represent an accurate cross-section of our modern enlisted man.  Jamie Foxx is another character given nothing to do, but is further saddled with a colorless and thankless role, leading one to wonder why he signed on to the project in the first place. 

That’s not to say that Jarhead is without it’s charms or merits.  There are more than a few moments of comedic gold, but once the laugh dies down it’s difficult to not go through the mental checklist of war movie moments.  Full Metal Jacket?  Three Kings?  Just like Ragu, it’s in there.  And so on and so on.  It’s a hard game to escape from when even the film itself seems to be playing along, with it’s multiple references to Apocalypse Now and Full Metal Jacket.  While it’s charms are many, it’s just hard to care much about what’s going on.  Much life Desert Storm itself, the film teases us with the potential for more, but repeatedly fails to deliver anything of substance.

 

More than anything I’m disappointed by Jarhead because I simply wanted to like it more than I did.  Gyllenhaal and Sarsgaard are exceptionally talented actors, but can’t work past the limitations of the script.  The film is beautifully shot, but what’s the point if what’s show ultimately leads us no where?  Do we really need another movie to tell us that war fucks up it’s participants?  I’m not sure many of us haven’t already learned that lesson.  The film posits itself as apolitical, but there’s blatent messages to be found in everything from the dialogue of the soldiers to the text telling us how many troops have been deployed.  Perhaps this is the logical result of a generation of filmmakers who have not experienced war themselves.

In the end, this is a film to see for the performances, not the story.  It’s enjoyable, but eventually it’ll fade from memory, leaving only the vague impressions.