CANON HAMLIN
Staff Writer
A lone soldier rushes out of the transport as bullets rush by him. Mortar explosions pound the desert beside him, spraying sand into his eyes and face. He pulls out his rifle, aims and shoots at two Iraqi soldiers, as snipers on the hill above him kill his two squad mates.
Typical war movies involve a similar scene, where a heroic soldier makes a stand against a ferocious enemy.
“Jarhead” is not a typical war movie.
“Jarhead,” based on the memoir of Anthony Swafford, is the story of one Marine’s life during the first Gulf War. The movie puts the viewer face to face with many misconceptions about the United States’ first foray into Iraq. Jake Gyllenhaal plays Marine Swafford, who enlists because he “got lost on the way to college.”
The film is full of many gritty, tense moments, but most of them are not how audiences would normally picture them in a war movie.
“Jarhead” seems to accurately capture the tension most soldiers might feel while they are stationed thousands of miles away in a foreign land, waiting for an enemy to strike.
Stress, an eagerness to shoot something and even boredom play into their roles as the film follows first the Marine’s training, placement in Iraq and, finally, the first battles of the Gulf War. The Marines eventually settle into a routine of training, boredom, training, hydration, boredom and sleep.
Swafford never shoots a single enemy throughout the film, a fact that just about describes the film in its entirety. This is not a true war movie. It is more of a waiting-for-war-to-start movie.
Throughout all of this, memorable moments abound. There is an energetic football game in full gas-attack gear played entirely for the benefit of onlooking journalists.
Jamie Foxx plays the squad’s staff sergeant, who provides many comic moments. The film also shows how many unfaithful wives and girlfriends the soldiers have back home through the “Wall of Shame” emblazoned with photos of their now-exes.
The camera work is, simply put, amazing. The starkness of the naked desert compared to the lush fields of the first training area is striking. With no vegetation, no permanent buildings and no roads in sight, it is easy to see why the soldiers waiting for war were so impatient.
As with most movies now, the main character always finds a way to take his or her shirt off. In this case, Gyllenhaal is filmed entirely naked in a shower scene, to the delight of women throughout the audience.
Unfortunately, “Jarhead” tries to be too aloof to the situation at hand.
Despite many obvious connections that war has to present-day America, we are told by one soldier that there are “no politics: this is war.” The characters provide occasional emotional morsels, but with no attachments.
Moviegoers used to likeable characters will be sorely disappointed.
Even Swafford, who is the main character of the entire film, is not portrayed in a completely positive light.
The film’s main point, if there is one, is lost by how much the film distances itself from its characters.
However, the movie will hold your interest and is extremely funny in many places.
Viewers who want to be entertained by a movie will be treated to an excellent mix of camerawork, scripting, dramatic scenes and, to a lesser extent, a naked Gyllenhaal.
Just don’t expect “Jarhead” to illuminate a greater point about life or take a stand on current world issues.
11-10-2005