Letters From Iwo Jima

Letters From Iwo Jima is Clint Eastwood's companion piece to his earlier Flags of Our Fathers. This time the battle of Iwo Jima is told from the Japanese side. They were defending a small, inhospitable island that was part of their sovereign territory, and if lost, would provide a base for a U.S. attack on the Japanese mainland.

Unlike Flags, which I did not care for, this film is strictly about war. While Flags brought the story home and dealt with the men who were celebrated as heroes for lifting the flag in the famous photograph, the soldiers in Letters From Iwo Jima are depicted as doomed from the outset. There are a few flashbacks to their lives outside of war, but most of the film consists of them preparing for attack, defending against attack, and then losing. Every one of them seems to realize they are on a suicide mission, but it is part of their culture to fight to the death.

This is really an interesting bit of cinema, for it is a conventional war movie but from the perspective of the enemy to the United States. The similarities are both subtle and basic. For example, we get the platoon with soldiers of different types. Primarily there is Saigo, played by Kazunari Ninomiya. He is a simple baker, and is like the Japanese equivalent of Sad Sack. He wants nothing to do with the fight, and isn't too caught up in the whole ritual suicide thing. Then there is Shimizu, who is a by-the-books soldier who believes that the Americans are savages, but over the course of the carnage he learns his priorities may have been misplaced.

Parallel to the story of the grunts is that of command. Ken Watanabe is magnificent as General Kuribayashi, a man who spent time in the U.S. He is pragmatic but also believes in his country. The sorrow etched in his face is truly heartbreaking. Also impressive is Tsuyoshi Ihara as Baron Nishi, the tank commander. He was an equestrain Olympian, and hobnobbed with Hollywood stars. When an American soldier is captured, he speaks to him in English and asks him if he knows who Douglas Fairbanks and Mary Pickford are. The soldier says yes, and Nishi wistfully recalls that he was guests at their house. When Nishi translates a letter from the soldier's mother in Oklahoma, and they realize how similar they are, it's very moving.

Saigo and the General interact periodically throughout the film, and their final encounter, as the island is being overrun, is almost Shakespearean the way it unites foot-soldier and general. This is just one example of the wonderful script by Iris Yamashita and Paul Haggis. Another is the case of a soldier named Ito, who wants to fight to the death, and straps bombs to himself hoping a tank will run over him and he can take it out. Fate has a different outcome for Ito, though.

This film is reminiscent of other war films that are from the point of view of the vanquished, particularly Civil War films that feature the Confederacy. The futility of war is not a new concept, but it doesn't hurt to remind ourselves of it, particularly in a film that is this well crafted.