WWII movie review
Summary:
During WWII, the US Army attacked a key island for the Japanese named “Iwo Jima”. A General, Tadamichi Kuribayashi, is send on that island to make the troops resists as long as they can but everybody knows the Japanese are going to lose. Kuribayashi has a very different approach of war than most of his subordinates. He went to the USA and knows the enemy.
The movie follows Kuribayashi; a baker, Saigo, who just want the war to be over and see his wife and newborn daughter; Lieutenant Ito, a very traditional warrior and Baron Nishi, an Olympic equestrian champion. Kuribayashi is a great leader who cares about his soldiers but he’s seen like pro-american by some. The General give the order to spare the food and to start digging in the island floor made of rocks. Because of the heat and malnutrition, the soldiers are suffering from dysentery. Then come Shimizu, from the prestigious police military academy, who is suspected to be a spy for unpatriotic talks and who was in fact disgraced because he didn’t killed a dog he was supposed to.
The war begins when American soldiers enters one of the Japanese beach and Kuribayashi says that every Japanese soldier is only allowed to die if they kill10 enemies. The American are superior in number and take a part of the island. When the general asked a troop to come back, the leader of that troops lies and tells his soldiers to commit suicide, only two of them will refuse to die and go back to Kuribayashi. Also, two soldiers go to the enemy in hope for water and food. However, the two American soldiers left to guard them are angry to be left behind and shoot the two Japanese. Saigo is asked by the general to burn the letters the soldiers and him have received but Saigo will bury them.
As the Japanese are losing the island, they hear a song sang by children to thank them for holding on on the radio, they go on a last fight with the general Kuribayashi in the first row. Almost every soldier will die. Saigo will be captured be the American and be taken to the “hospital”.
Review:
I think it’s a really good movie. That was interesting because for once, it wasn’t the american point of view of the war like it usually is. The actors were good and the people who did the casting did really good job. I liked the fact that most of the actors were native from Japan. I could empathize for them. I was sad at the end so that why I say they did well because I wasn’t indifferent to the story. I could see them struggle and question their lives, it wasn’t just about blood and killing people like in a lot of war movies but getting to know who the soldiers were before the war.
I was disappointed because I had to read the subtitles all the time but I guess Eastwood wanted to have more realism in his movie. You just have to focus all the time and it sometimes hard.
Also, the war on the island lasted for 36 days but in the movie, I had the impression that is was much shorter like one or two days. I think they should have done something to make it appear longer. I liked the part when soldiers read their letters because it shows that even if they kill people, they are humans and still have emotions. It just makes you realize that you don’t want to live a war.
Comments
Good job but break your info up into shorter paragraphs.