Movie-Holic

As a kind of a new segment here at Movie-Holics.com, I thought I would let you into my world a little bit and begin to tell you what I’ll be watching each day.

Today, I’m going to start it off with a movie that I haven’t seen yet. I read the book Flags of our Fathers a few months ago and enjoyed it so I thought I’d pick up the DVD and give it a watch.

If it stays true to the book, then I think I’ll enjoy it. I love WWII movies and true stories are even better. I don’t know much about the movie, except for what is on IMDB So, I don’t have any expectations for the movie other than to stay close to the book. I’ll let you know what I think as an update to this post.

Update

There are some movies that you just want to rave about. Then there are those that you quickly want to forget because they make you dumber just having watched them. Flags of Our Fathers is somewhere in the middle.

I liked it. I just didn’t love it.

The movie was a mix of both flashbacks during the battle of Iwo Jima, the raising of the flag, and what happened to the three soldiers who survived the battle and went on a tour of the US to sell war bonds. There wasn’t much in the battle, or raising the flag. It seemed the main focus was on the afterwards.

I guess when I watch a movie I have certain expectations, or rather, how I would like the movie to go. I wanted to see more of the background of the soldiers and more of the battle for the island. I thought they were more pivotal to the story than what happened after. I didn’t get that. What Clint Eastwood, who directed this film, did was focus on the aftermath.

At 2 hours and 12 mins. Flags of Our Fathers definitely had the time to concentrate on different aspects of the soldiers lives, much like the book did, but instead chose to focus on just the three who made it.

Another little problem with the film was the fact that is it based on a book. I kept getting the feeling that if I hadn’t of read the book first I would have been lost. The other soldier’s weren’t explained and you didn’t really get to know about them. Didn’t really get to know about the three that lived either. I felt that was something that should have been dealt with.

On the plus side, the battle action was great. The sounds, sights, and acting were truly good and right up there with Saving Private Ryan, or We Were Soldiers.

The story was good too. If you don’t know much about the raising of the Iwo Jima flag or the events that followed then Flags of our Fathers is a nice peek into each part.

All in all… a decent movie. Nothing superb, but not incredibly bad either. Just a good movie.