A Poet's Look at Everywar

"The Thin Red Line" was one of my favorite novels as a teenager, but I found it hardly recognizable it in Malick's wondrous adaptation. Jones' novel was a dense, gritty, but straightforward account of men in battle. Jones purists may object to what Malick has done, and I normally would too, but not this time. Malick has taken Jones' powerful material and made it is own.

"The Thin Red Line's" story involves the exploits of a platoon of soldiers fighting and dying in the Battle of Guadalcanal, one of the crucial battles of World War II. This is a series of vignettes, constructed like a Robert Altman movie, all wrapped together in a skein like mosaic. Characters drop in and drop out in nonlinear fashion, giving the film the feel of a fever dream.

Most of it centers around Witt (James Caviezel), a chronically AWOL private with a passion for knowing whether there is any light on the other side of the thin line between life and death. There's also the war of compassionate Captain Staros (Elias Koteas), with the overbearing opportunistic Lt. Colonel Tall (Nick Nolte, excellent again), who is willing to sacrifice as many men as possible to further his military career. And there's Corporal Bell (Ben Chaplin), consumed by achingly poetic memories of the wife he's left behind (Marty Bell).

This is not "Saving Private Ryan." Besides avoiding the burden of "Ryan"'s rather unconvincing storyline, Malick strips away most of the historical context, raising it (or reducing it depending on your point of view) it to the level of Everywar: an experience of pure survival. Again, this is risky (for not all wars are quite the same and frankly, I'm no pacifist). But he does successfully convey the universality of its horror, suffering and absurdity.

And while "Ryan" took pains to reveal the dreadful physical destruction, Malick actually pulls back a little, choosing to emphasize war as an emotional nightmare that pushes all its participants, friend and foe alike, to the thin line that separates madness and sanity.

Malick uses another unique feature: voiceover narration. Again, a risky technique that can rapidly sink to cloying banality, but both Malick the screenwriter and his actors are up to the challenge. The monologues take us on a haunting, soulful journey into the hearts of soldiers marching to war while meditating on their deepest desire for life, love and peace.

The actors are almost all excellent, including Sean Penn as Sergeant Welsh, Private Witt's superior, who tries to probe the eccentric mystery lying at the center of Witt's heart. John Cusack and Woody Harrelson are both effective in their brief appearances. Harrelson, in fact, does the best work I've seen from him.

But the highest praise must be received for Terrence Malick and his team of film makers. They've done a remarkable thing: creating a dream film for mainstream audiences. Hans Zimmer's score works emotional wonders. Cinematographer John Toll, who did such superb work on "Legends of the Fall" and "Braveheart," outdoes himself, helping Malick create a mystical vision of war in the context of wild nature. Toll pulls up shockingly rich color tones that sometimes remind me of Paul Gauguin's tropical paintings. It's like a nature film that has suddenly found itself under attack by civilization's brute force. Exotic tropical birds fly through whizzing bullets. A soldier crawling up a hill under fire toward a Japanese bunker, retreats in the face of an attack by a poisonous viper. "The Thin Red Line" tells us that whatever the grim facts of nature, they are preferable to the modern world's brutality. It evokes a Roussean attitude toward life that you may not agree with, but it does so with such dreamlike passion, it's hard to resist.

To be sure there are flaws. At three hours, it feels long, and might be *judiciously* trimmed. Also co-stars Chaplin and Caviezel look so much alike, it's difficult sorting out their characters. And occasionally the film teeters on the edge of treacly. But most of all, like "Private Ryan," the film succumbs badly to the current trend of "cameo casting" in the persons of John Travolta (as a Brigadier General!) and George Clooney as a Captain who replaces Captain Staros. I like both stars, but Travolta simply isn't up to his role and seeing Clooney in this context is like Cary Grant popping up in "The Wild Bunch." Almost every male star in Hollywood competed to be in this film. Too bad those two didn't lose out.

But those are quibbles. "The Thin Red Line" replaces "Gods and Monsters" in my heart as 1998's best film. It's great to have Terrence Malick back with his unique vision. He should stick around this time.

[Thomas Burchfield can be reached at TBDeluxe@aol.com and appears regularly in Swing Time magazine.]

Reproduction of material from posthoc is prohibited without written permission.

Copyright 2001, Posthoc, Inc.