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Rating: 10/10 (28 December 2003)

Contains Spoiler I hardly find another way to evaluate a film than pointing out the scenes that stay with me. The camera, as it remains fixed on Inman's face, after the desperate widow shoots the soldier whom we know is innocent, one feels the despair in his washed out expression; that he has nothing to hold onto, except to move on, since there are those few precious moments in memory that demand a final word. There is the old woman who soothes Inman's wounds, also soothing his soul; his love pours out in words. There is Ada digging the soil; her awkwardness in life striking her, maddening and incapacitating her; she still exercises the art of eloquent speech, when she needs desperately to learn to work her fragile body. There is Ada's photo, being charred in the remains of the fire, when Inman, in his zombie-like resurrection, saves it from ceasing to exist, or maybe he doesn't and I am imagining this (remembering a film is always an act of imagination) There is the parade of the American flag, as it sweeps across a land exploded into a dark, saturated, reddish glow. What must that photo, and those few letters from Ada have meant for him, during the time of death, when they are always at the brink of being lost, being left behind. There is also forgetfulness, in the cheery obscene dinner table where caresses are swapped beneath the table, along with vulgar proposals, when raw, immediate desire threatens the abstract, precious memory.There is the promise of the green forest, when it stretches, from a bird's view,immeasurable distances and also its deceit, when it proves itself inhospitable for refuge. There is the irony of Inman's appearance, at the very moment when Ada grasps the workings of the world, surprised at her own ability to cope.