Reviewing Movies

The first thing that struck me about this movie is that the Americans had no monopoly on fubar and snafu. The second is the humanity and common sense of General Tadamichi Kuribayashi. He is intelligent enough to want to see his command from the ground on foot, not from the back seat of a staff car. He also ordered that the officers would have the same rations as his troups. The entire movie is in Japanese, unfortunately the same care wasn't taken in using ethnic Japanese music. As the realization dawns on the men from their leaders on down that they have been abandoned to fight to their deaths each struggles to find honour and meaning in their efforts. Some take their anger out on those below them, some prepare for ritual suicide, many think of events in their past, and most write letters home to their loved ones. As a companion movie to Flags of Our Fathers we are given to see that these men were not unlike their adversaries in their dreams, their fears, their hopes. Unfortunately too few of these men made it home again for there to be any study made of their post war struggles.