Flags of Our Fathers - R

A harrowing look at the truth behind a U.S. icon.

Rating: R for for sequences of graphic war violence and carnage, and for language. Studio: Dreamworks SKG Directed By: Clint Eastwood Cast: Jesse Bradford, Ryan Phillippe, Adam Beach Running Time: 132 minutes Release Date: 10/19/2006 Genre: Drama

Common Sense Note

Parents need to know that this harrowing World War II drama isn't for kids. The battlefield violence is graphic, with weapons ranging from tanks and grenades (explosions, flying bodies) to bayonets and knives (close-up assaults, with bloody, ravaged effects visible). The film opens with a battlefield-set nightmare, then cuts frequently between the present and flashbacks to the brutal fighting and the tour, so it's not always clear when the violence will be cropping up. Characters use frequent profanity (mostly "f--k"), smoke cigarettes in nearly every scene (except in the heat of battle), and drink plenty of alcohol, with one man in particular becoming drunk as he grieves his dead comrades and feels guilty for surviving. There's a brief reference to masturbation.

Families can discuss the legacy of World War II, often thought of as the "good war." What gets left out of the equation (pain, violence, other devastating experiences) when people look back and focus on the heroism of war? Is there such a thing as the "true" version of history? Also, how do the men who go on the fund-raising tour realize that they're being treated as commercial products? How do they suffer as a consequence? How does the movie question the notion of "heroism" as it's used to promote war?

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Common Sense Review

Reviewed By: Cynthia Fuchs

In FLAGS OF OUR FATHERS, the island of Iwo Jima has a particular look: grand, daunting, and otherworldly. When U.S. Marines land on the beach in 1945, they look over the lava-rock moonscape before them, up toward Mount Suribachi, where they'll end up raising the U.S. flag as a premature sign of triumph. And they have no idea what hardships will precede or follow that flag-raising (which was captured in Joe Rosenthal's Pulitzer Prize-winning photo).

A large, roiling reassessment of the relationships between war, commerce, and mythology, Clint Eastwood's film is at once magnificent and disquieting. It begins in mid-nightmare, during a dark night on Iwo Jima: Navy corpsman "Doc" Bradley (played in his younger incarnation by Ryan Phillippe, with George Grizzard stepping in as the elderly dreamer) appears in close-up, his face distraught. All around him, injured men call for his help, and when he tries to treat them -- their wounds bloody and gaping -- he also loses track of his best friend, Iggy (Jamie Bell). Such trauma -- wrapped up in feelings of loss, fear, desperation -- haunts Doc; he doesn't talk about the war or his participation in the flag-raising (a fact that strains his family, too).

The film is structured as a series of flashbacks and interviews that Doc's son, James (Tom McCarthy), conducts with men who knew his father during the war. Pointedly, these stories focus on the pain, fear, and calamity of combat, as well as the difficulties faced by the three surviving flag-raisers, whom the government sent on tour across the United States to encourage people to buy war bonds and support the war effort.

The ironies are many. First, the tableau that Doc and his fellow flag-raisers, Marines Rene Gagnon (Jesse Bradford) and Ira Hayes (Adam Beach) appeared in -- the one shot by Rosenthal and published all over the world -- was the second flag-raising of the day (the first was too small to be seen from the beaches). What's more, both events were premature, taking place on the fifth day of what turned out to be a 35-day battle. And last but not least, the men in the photo still mourn the loss of their fellow flag-raisers, who were killed on Iwo Jima.

The photographed flag-raisers also feel exploited by the fundraising process. They're disrespected by their "handlers" and roped into cheesy appearances. Repeatedly, they must wave to cheering crowds, extol the war (even though they've seen its horrors), and pose atop what Ira calls a "pile of papier mâché" that's supposed to look like Mount Suribachi.

Flags of Our Fathers also exposes the specific hardships encountered by Ira, a Pima Indian who's dogged by racism, both by his fellow Marines (they call him names like "redskin") and among civilians (a senator greets him by saying "I hear you used a tomahawk on those Japs!"). Distraught over the friendly fire death of his beloved sergeant, Mike Strank (Barry Pepper), and increasingly unhappy over the tour's indignities, Ira drinks heavily. Eventually, after returning to the front and retiring from the military, Ira is found dead at age 33, a victim of "exposure," according to the coroner's report.

Large, complex, and earnest, Flags of Our Fathers emphasizes that the flag-rasiers most admire their fallen friends, who didn't "think of themselves as heroes." In doing so, the film indicts the war-makers -- then and now -- who have "never been to war" but still send young men to fight, and honors those warriors who saw and committed acts, both horrific and heroic, that they can never forget.

Families who like this movie might also want to see The Great Raid (just be aware that its representations of the Japanese are racist in an old-fashioned, WWII-movie way), Windtalkers (also starring Adam Beach), Saving Private Ryan, The Sands of Iwo Jima (1949), The Outsider (a 1961 movie about Ira Hayes starring Tony Curtis), or Eastwood's companion film to Flags, Letters from Iwo Jima. You might also want to read the book on which the film is based, James Bradley's Flags of Our Fathers.

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Content		CS	adults	kids
Content
Sexual Content A joke about "masturbation papers" is played on a young Marine.
Violence Repeated, harrowing violence (mostly related to war): explosions, gunfire, bayoneting, stabbing; weapons include flamethrowers, cannons, automatic weapons, tanks, swords, grenades, missiles; are bodies thrown and exploded; grisly images include a head dropping on one soldier, heroes stabbing enemies, Japanese suicides by grenades, burning bodies, a tank rolling over a body, and Marines killed by "friendly fire" from a Navy ship; a body is discovered in a corral by kids (the body is viewed from above, at a distance).
Language Repeated use of "f--k" (30+), as well as frequent other profanity ("s--t," "jackass," "a--hole," "hell," "damn"); thematic and repeated pejorative references to Ira's Native American idenity ("redskin," "squaw," "wigwam"); derogatory reference to "A-rabs."
Message
	Social Behavior The administration exploits the young flag-raisers to sell war bonds; there's racism directed toward a Native American Marine; heroes argue, drink, and fight; criticism of the artifice of the fund-raising tour; lying to mothers of dead Marines.
	Commercialism Flag-raisers are treated as commercial "product," so the issue is thematic.
	Drug/Alcohol/Tobacco Frequent cigarette smoking (soldiers smoke incessantly, except when in battle); hard, sad drinking (Ira drinks to get drunk, then stumbles, cries, and acts out his frustrations).