Hey folks, Harry here, I'm now very anxious to see WINDTALKERS, with two very consistent reviewers (Capone and Quint) and a conversation I had with Joe Hallenbeck (who also dug the film) I'm now really genuinely jazzed to see this movie. Here's Capone telling it as only a pasta man could...
Hey, Harry. Capone in Chicago here to talk about a two films in brief and one at length. It's been a busy week here in the Windy City. In addition to yesterday's BAD COMPANY review, I've also seen LILO & STITCH, which has been covered to death on this site, so I won't add to the pile-on except to say that I loved it almost as much as THE IRON GIANT. It's that good, and I was shocked how moved I was by it and by how much it made me laugh. I also saw what will probably be the year's big film for women, DIVINE SECRETS OF THE YA-YA SISTERHOOD. I liked this quite a bit as well. Ellen Burstyn should be granted status as a goddess on Mt. Olympus. Although hardly the tour-de-force of REQUIEM FOR A DREAM, her performance here is simply beautiful. And I have to give it up to Ashley Judd playing the same character many years younger. She plays psycho bitch mother about as well as anyone I've seen since MOMMIE DEAREST. The film's big surprise isn't THAT big a surprise, but it's getting there that's the pay off. Two good films. But what I'm really here to discuss is the much-delayed WINDTALKERS. And we're off...
There are two things that the new John Woo film, WINDTALKERS, does not lack: volume and explosions. If you are a fan of both, there’s no way you won’t love this movie. More importantly, this may be the first U.S.-made John Woo that resembles his older (and frankly, better) Hong Kong works with Chow Yun Fat. Unlike BROKEN ARROW, FACE/OFF, and MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE 2, WINDTALKERS takes us inside the minds of Woo’s lead characters and shows us the tortured pasts of soldiers who have seen the worst that men can do to each other and lived to talk about it.
After a brief introduction showing how Native Americans were recruited for a very special purpose during WWII, the film opens in a deafening burst of machine gun fire, as Marine Joe Enders (Nicolas Cage in one of his better moody performances) heads a small group of men in a mission to hold a position on a nothing island in the South Pacific. He fails in his mission, and all of his men are slaughtered. Enders is left by the Japanese for dead, and he eventually makes it to a military hospital in Hawaii where he is cared for by Nurse Rita (Frances O’Connor). Enders having to witness the death of so many men under his care is clearly eating him alive. His inner (and outer) ear were damaged severely during the attack, and his balance and hearing are significantly affected. He manages to get reassigned to a special task that involves acting as bodyguard to a Navajo Indian. It seems that after months of having their codes broken by the Japanese, the Marines decided to use the native Navajo language as their new unbreakable code. Navajos were recruited and training as soldiers and code talkers, who spoke to each other via radios. Each Navajo was assigned a Marine to guard them. The catch: the Marines are told explicitly not to let these Navajos fall into Japanese hands, thus risking the code. If it looked like a Navajo might be captured, he was to be killed by his protector.
The wonderful Adam Beach (SMOKE SIGNALS) is Private Ben Yahzee, Enders Navajo. The two have a tentative relationship at first. Yahzee wants to become friends with Enders (he’s unaware of Enders’ directive); Enders wants to keep his distance. Not surprisingly, the Navajos are not accepted by the Marines. One Marine tells Yahzee that, in his mind, the only thing separating him from the Japanese is the uniform. Christian Slater and Roger Willie play another, less-at-odds pairing of Marine and Navajo. In fact, both men come off like saints in this story, so we guess pretty early on they probably won’t live out the film. We also know early on that at some point toward the end of the film, Enders will find himself in a situation where he is supposed to kill Yahzee as ordered. This part of the plot did not play out how I’d expected it to, which is good since I wasn’t expected too many surprises from WINDTALKERS. Also on hand for the Marines are Peter Stormare as the Sergeant in charge of Enders group, Noah Emmerich as the most racist of the group, and Mark Ruffalo as Pappas, whose a little bit of a coward.
The rhythm of WINDTALKERS is established fairly early in the story: violent and loud battle followed by soul-searching, bonding, and character development. With a lesser group of actors or a weaker director, this might not have worked as well, but Woo and his crew tell a story that’s never been told before using fairly straight-forward techniques. There’s no reason to do it any other way. Enders suffers from horrifying flashbacks and Yahzee’s Navajo spirituality rub off on Enders to ease his trouble psyche. With each break between fighting, we learn a little more about the surviving soldiers and know that we will be a little more saddened if one of them dies. And there is much death in WINDTALKERS. I warn you now, if you don’t like violence, move to a state where this movie isn’t playing because the blood-and-guts factors is about as high as it can get. We don’t just see buildings, earth, and vehicles get blown up, we see humans explode and the parts burn. This is not done in a glorified manner, but that doesn’t made it any less believable or horrific. You’ve been warned.
If you can stomach these scary moments, WINDTALKERS is a thinking person’s war film. It’s not an anti-war film, but clearly Woo fins war atrocious. The Marines in the movie don’t ponder the meaning of life in general and the futility of war; they think about their individual lives and what makes them worth living, and how they would very much like to keep on living to make those lives happen. All at once, WINDTALKERS is a draining, thought-provoking, and a life-reinforcing experience.
Capone
