20 minutes of cake throwing followed by Wayne doing his best job acting like his legs don't work. It's a tonelly inconsistent relatively standard biopic running into your normal biopic flaws. Nothing too special but an interesting role for John Wayne

20 minutes of cake throwing followed by Wayne doing his best job acting like his legs don't work. It's a tonelly inconsistent relatively standard biopic running into your normal biopic flaws. Nothing too special but an interesting role for John Wayne

for every institutional victory, we see a personal tragedy. while ford was a certified troop respecter it’s interesting how willing he was to show the moral and psychological complexity of military life. wead’s immediate automatic decision to re-enlist after pearl harbor, and his wife’s acceptance of this, really does bring to mind jean-marie straubs famous description of john ford as “more brecht than brecht”, as he lays bare the (almost) suicidal devotion to institutionalism characteristic of the american navy. sort of follows the fort apache/long gray line structure where bozo humor slowly recedes into a much more somber and humanistic questioning of what came before.

for every institutional victory, we see a personal tragedy. while ford was a certified troop respecter it’s interesting how willing he was to show the moral and psychological complexity of military life. wead’s immediate automatic decision to re-enlist after pearl harbor, and his wife’s acceptance of this, really does bring to mind jean-marie straubs famous description of john ford as “more brecht than brecht”, as he lays bare the (almost) suicidal devotion to institutionalism characteristic of the american navy. sort of follows the fort apache/long gray line structure where bozo humor slowly recedes into a much more somber and humanistic questioning of what came before.