Four stars. Rated R, for graphic war action, gore and dramatic intensity
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 11.4.16
Factual war dramas often are
remembered for seminal sequences: the badly outnumbered British soldiers at
Rorke’s Drift, who withstood the final onslaught by native warriors, in 1964’s Zulu; George C. Scott’s electrifying
opening speech, in 1970’s Patton; and
the Omaha Beach assault that kicked off 1998’s Saving Private Ryan, to name a few.
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| Once word spreads that Desmond (Andrew Garfield, right) refuses to wield or even touch a weapon, Smitty (Luke Bracey, left) is the first to register contempt and hostility: How can he — or anybody else in their division — trust a man who smacks of cowardice? |
Indeed, the latter set a new bar
for gripping, ghastly, battlefield intensity.
Until now.
Director Mel Gibson’s impressive Hacksaw Ridge is another reminder that,
even with a long string of inspiring World War II dramas stretching back to the
1940s, fresh stories remain to be told. The best are those able to personalize
the ordeal, by focusing on a few unforgettable individuals, or perhaps just
one.
Hacksaw Ridge is the first dramatic depiction
of American Army medic Desmond T. Doss’ experiences in the war: specifically
his actions with the 77th Division — dubbed the “Statue of Liberty Division” —
when it was ordered to take the Maeda Escarpment on Okinawa, as part of the
Allied push to mainland Japan.
Frankly, I can’t understand what
took Hollywood so long; Doss’ story screams
for big-screen treatment.
Scripters Andrew Knight and Robert
Schenkkan didn’t even have a mainstream biography on which to base their film
treatment (although an obscure small-press book — Booton Herndon’s Unlikeliest Hero — was published in
1982). They were able to draw from Terry Benedict’s award-winning 2004
documentary, The Conscientious Objector.
That title cuts to the core of Doss’ unique status: He was the only American
soldier in World War II to fight on the front lines without a weapon.
As a Seventh-Day Adventist, Doss
believed strongly that killing was against God’s Sixth Commandment. But he also
insisted on serving his country in a meaningful way —obtaining a deferment, due
to his employment at a naval shipyard, seemed cowardly — and therefore viewed a
role in the army medical corps as a logical compromise.
It wasn’t to be that simple.
Gibson opens with a brief
flash-forward to the chaos on Okinawa — a pointless foreshadowing of the
carnage to come — and then takes us back to Desmond’s youth and young
adulthood. He came of age in a household terrorized by his alcoholic father,
Tom (Hugo Weaving): a man unable to forgive himself for surviving his WWI
service, when so many of his friends and fellow soldiers died. Weaving makes
Tom a forlorn and unstable — even dangerous — wreck, but not an entirely unsympathetic
monster. In fact, Tom gets his shot at redemption, later in the story.
A couple of seminal events harden
Desmond’s decision never to wield a gun, or take a life by any other means. We
don’t doubt his resolve.
