Sam Mendes goes to war

Rating: 7/10 (19 January 2006)

The indelible stamp of the classic Vietnam war movies are all over Jarhead, the new movie from Sam Mendes, writer of American Beauty and Road to Perdition. From the opening boot camp sequence that couldn't be more in debt to R Lee Ermey's turn as the drill sergeant in Full Metal Jacket, to the boys in the platoon psyching themselves up for the first Gulf war by watching the helicopter attack sequence in Apocalypse Now and joyfully singing along to 'Ride of the Valkyries.' However, the similarities end there, for rather than being a Vietnam movie set in a desert, Jarhead is an altogether different beast.
It tells the true life story of Anthony 'Swoff' Swofford, (a fantastic Jake Gyllenhall), a twenty year old marine sniper who gets shipped out to fight the Iraqi army and the experiences he has there. Rather than being met by all-out carnage and bloodshed though, Swofford finds himself faced with many long, boring months sat out in the desert with nothing but his platoon mates for company. Once there, he finds himself falling into a routine of sleep, eat, exercise, masturbate and sleep again, all the while waiting for a war that when it finally does come, is over in a heartbeat ("four days, four hours and twenty minutes, that was my war"). It is no surprise then that tempers become frayed and frustrations come to the surface in many ugly ways (Swofford finds himself ranting at a fellow soldier at one point while sticking an M16 into the terrified man's face) and the end result is deeply uncomfortable. These are men bred for war, who didn't get to have one.
In this respect it's certainly an intriguing watch and to add to the experience, the cinematography is stunning. The desert shimmers with such radiance you can almost feel the heat rising from the screen and the sight of a blazing, oil drenched field is a veritable feast for the eyes.
If a criticism can be levelled at Jarhead though, it would be that it doesn't have a strong political message. Sure, the American military machine is glorified in the first half then ruthlessly savaged in the second as men who are bred to kill break down in tears or go mad, but given the current political climate, many will certainly feel let down that there aren't more stabs at the nature of the modern day Iraq situation. Peter Saarsgard may provide a angry tirade about how they're fighting for oil, not people, but it's a brief shot in a film that otherwise asks the viewer to draw their own conclusions.