My interest is always piqued when another war film hits the theaters. As a cinemaphile, I’m concerned with seeing a well-conceived, researched, and executed story that creates a profound emotional response. As a former military man, I’m most concerned with “fidelity,” primarily in the portrayal of the military characters’ motivations, dialogue & lingo, and uniforms. From a technical perspective, I also like to see an accurate portrayal (or at least a valiant attempt of an accurate portrayal) of military hierarchy, customs, and operations.

I have some experience in the realm of technical accuracy in military films, serving as a military advisor for the film, “We Were Soldiers,” starring Mel Gibson. Oddly enough, my great-grandfather, with whom I share first and last names, was also a military advisor for several films in the 1950’s. Although neither of us obviously had any impact on the writing of the films we worked on, I can say with confidence that I feel good about doing my best to help create an accurate portrayal of the technical aspects of soldiering, including spending several weeks with the entire cast in a bootcamp environment, training them on the fundamentals of military weapons, tactics, jargon, and how to wear the uniform properly.

There has been a lot of talk in recent months about why recently released Iraq War films have failed to strike gold at the box office with American audiences. Here’s a look at the box office take from a recent slate of films (from the website www.cinematical.com):

In the Valley of Elah (2007) – $6.8 million.
Stop Loss (2008) – $10.6 million
Redacted (2007) – $.06 million.
Home of the Brave (2006) – $.04 million

The conventional wisdom is that we are overloaded with information about Iraq and would rather “escape” when we head to the theaters, rather than sit through a commentary on something that is happening in real time on the other side of the globe. One film critic, Betty Jo Tucker, put it this way:

Because information and/or visuals about the Iraq War and the War on Terror run almost 24/7 on television news, the internet and radio, we are less likely to pay money for a film about them.

To the first point, I couldn’t disagree more. Americans are fascinated with “reality.” The popularity and pervasiveness of Reality Television (another area in which I have professional experience) is a testament to this fact. (Although I will say that the word, “reality,” has taken on new meaning in recent years to imply a phenomenon – Reality TV – that resembles reality as a close facsimile, but actually bears few commonalities with the everyday waking experience we traditionally refer to as reality, but that’s another blog post entirely).

The other reason commonly offered to explain the lack of box office success of the recent Iraq films is that these films impart a negative portrayal of the war and American audiences would rather see a film that is inspiring or portrays American soldiers in a positive manner.

The second point has some legs but doesn’t tell the whole story as to why these films have been unsuccessful. Certainly, many of these films are telling a story that is not particularly sunny. The conflict itself isn’t a terribly happy affair, so I would argue that it would be nearly impossible to create light-hearted Iraq War films. But I don’t think Americans are looking for stories that are light-hearted and whimsical when it comes to this subject matter. In fact, understanding what are we are looking for when we go to the movies helps us understand why these films have been lackluster at the box office.

So what are we looking for at the movies, you ask? Primarily, it’s to be entertained. We call it the entertainment industry for a reason. In fact, I would argue that entertainment, in the form of movies, television, video games, the internet, and sports events, is one of our most important and valuable exports and one of the few things we continue to manufacture as a nation. Consider this: combining total entertainment revenues with advertising spending (a form of entertainment itself these days), Americans spent over ONE TRILLION DOLLARS on entertainment in 2007.

Let’s call a spade a spade: as a general rule, American filmmaking primarily serves as entertainment, not as art, and definitely not as political commentary. The artistry of film is a wonderful element in the presentation of the entertainment product, and certainly helps elevate entertaining fare into the realm artwork, but art is not the object of the vast majority of American film productions. And while very often social commentary is an intrinsic element of masterful American filmmaking, this element is not what initially brings people into theaters and inspires them to spread the word to others. Imagine this exchange taking place at the water cooler: “You’ve got to see this new movie Juno!” “Oh really, why?” “It really says a lot about the issues of reproductive rights, teenage pregnancy, and parenting!”

Instead, what we might actually hear is something like: “You have got to see Knocked Up, it’s freaking hilarious. I practically peed my pants!” That’s going to make me want to go see a movie. Later, when we’ve allowed the film to sink in, we might reflect on its nuances and its portrayal of the truths of becoming a parent for the first time that allow a film like this to transcend the comedy genre and enter into the realm of masterful America cinema. (Yeah, I said it. Masterful). This film works because it delivers the goods. It’s a comedy and it’s funny. Very simple. But this film exceeds just “working” and became a blockbuster because it not only delivered on the implied promise of the filmgoing experience – to entertain – but it also used that primary function of entertainment to open our minds to ideas that were identifiable in our own personal lives. It is this connection to the audience through our own personal identification, that is impossible without fidelity, without inherent truth, that makes a film great.

The lack of fidelity – which I referred to as “truth” in my review of the disappointing, “The Kingdom,” (which for some odd reason incorrectly gets lumped together with Iraq War films), combined with an absence of real entertainmnet value is the main culprit in the failures of recent Iraq War films to attract audiences. In short, Iraq movies haven’t succeeded financially because audiences aren’t interested in the overall subject matter; Iraq movies haven’t succeeded because they are simply bad movies, or at best, deeply flawed movies, or in the case of “In the Valley Elah,” arthouse fare that no one expected to take in $100 million at the box office.

“Redacted” is gimmicky, spiteful, and contains comically poor acting. Throw in an incredibly depressing subject matter – the rape of a young Iraqi girl by American soldiers – and you have a recipe for failure. The hack Brian De Palma’s “Casualties of War” was equally God-awful. “The Home of the Brave” is just plain bad – a soap opera-ish and melodramatic foray into the War genre with disastrous results.

I would like to spend a moment on the MTV Films recent release, “Stop Loss,” about an Iraq War vet who falls victim to the Army’s actual policy of “stop-lossing” soldiers in order to remedy their manpower shortages, whereby soldiers are forced to continue military service, even after they have honorably served their initial enlistment. I had a personal interest in this film because I myself was involuntarily recalled to serve in Iraq (illegally, it turned out) through a different “backdoor draft” program involving the Army’s Inactive Ready Reserve. But that’s a story for another time.

Getting back to the film, “Stop Loss,” the beginning of the film, in which we experience a sequence featuring Ryan Phillipe’s squad of soldiers on an operation in Iraq is promising, in that it is tense, exciting, scary, and ultimately entertaining. When the men return home, scarred physically and emotionally, the film takes on even greater tension when Phillipe’s character is informed that he won’t be getting out like he had planned. Instead, he’s been “stop-lossed,” and reassigned back into another unit that is returning to combat in Iraq. Believing this to be wrong and a violation of his enlistment contract, he makes a split-second decision to go on the run, ostensibly to seek help from his Senator in Washington, DC. Inexplicably, the girlfriend of his best friend and fellow soldier (wonderfully played by Chatum Tanning), decides to go on the lam with him, creating all sorts of tension between the two men when word gets back to the unit. The film then becomes a “road movie,” with several pitstops along the way in which Phillipe meets with the family of a soldier who died on his watch, runs into another soldier on the run, and reunites with an injured vet recovering from multiple amputations at an Army hospital somewhere.

The refrain we hear over an over again from Phillipe’s mouth is that this policy is wrong, that he served honorably while he was in, and that as a matter of principle, he can no longer serve. His options are few – either turn himself in and be subject to possible punishment for going AWOL, stay on the run, or utilize the services of a New York lawyer to emigrate to Canada – for good.

***SPOILER WARNING***: Besides degrading the film’s integrity through some pretty ridiculous time lapses, plot holes, and Herculean logistical feats (driving from New York City to Texas in what seems like a blink of an eye), director Kimbery Peirce degrades the integrity of her main character’s intentions by causing him to make decisions that contradict everything he has stood for throughout the movie. After spending the entire film lambasting the Army’s stop-loss policy and nearly sacrificing everything – his family, his reputation, his citizenship, his best friend – he decides in the last instant to abandon that line of thinking and return to duty in the final scene of the film, jumping on the bus with his band of brothers to head back off to Iraq. Why did we subject ourselves to his excellent adventure and his pontifications upon the flaws of our country’s war policies? We may not have agreed with Phillipe’s character, but at least he stood up for something. His last minute change of heart undermines the “fidelity” that the filmmaker worked so hard to create over the previous two hours. Perhaps he ultimately decides to stand up for his buddies and return to go fight with them, instead of standing up for his own view of right and wrong. Perhaps he abandons the desires of the self for the desires of the “greater good,” i.e. the safety and welfare of his men. Perhaps. And that’s an interesting dilemma for sure. But when you spend the whole movie arguing for the other side of the coin and then turn 180 degrees in the closing seconds of the film, the effect is to try to have it both ways and ultimately stand up for nothing. The filmmaker didn’t have the courage to allow her character to follow through on his convictions.

***END SPOILER ALERT***: The key to understanding the box office failure of this film is to realize that standing up for something and then failing to follow through on that conviction until the bitter end is inherently not entertaining. We are inspired by the courage of others, even when that courage involves doing something that might be unpopular. In the case of “Stop Loss,” the film is already at a disadvantage because although the Iraq War is incredibly unpopular, we as film going audiences still want to be entertained and lifted up. If an Iraq War film is to be financially successful, it needs to find a way to be entertaining to the core and ultimately inspiring. Take Oscar-winning film, “Platoon,” for example. It’s about an extremely unpopular war, it portrays the film in a predominately negative light, but at the end, even though Willem Dafoe’s Elias is ostensibly murdered by Tom Berenger’s Barnes in the closing moments, all the while Charlie Sheens’ Chris Taylor’s innocence is forever lost – we are ulimately inspired and moved by Elias’ final sacrifice. He didn’t have to do it and it was an arguably futile death, but he fulfilled his charactor’s destiny and fidelity by remaining noble until the bitter end.

It’s a shame “Stop Loss” isn’t good because it does raise important social and political issues. Channing Tatum is excellent in the film and Ryan Phillipe, despite the limitations of the script, did as best he could with the material provided. Despite the failures of the storyline, the director Kimberly Peirce did a decent job of accurately capturing the essence of being a young soldier, as the men in “Stop Loss,” were clearly taught, in the immortal words of “Stripes” Sgt. Hulka: “to eat, sleep, walk, talk, shoot, shit like a United States soldier.”