Nature Vying With Itself

Rating: 10/10 (17 January 2002)

I left the theater, after watching The Thin Red Line, in a complete
DAZE. My mind was over-filled with the sights and sounds, even
the smells, of a masterpiece of cinematic virtuosity unlike any I'd
experienced before. I walked home four miles in the bitter cold,
completely unaware of anything out-side my own mind, my inner
being, or the radiance of my renewed spirit.
This movie is not for the person who is unaware of themselves, or
has NO desire to see a film about characters who are, or become,
aware of the LIFE that surrounds them. It is a film about war. Two
wars. The war within as well as with-out the human spirit. It is
slow, deliberate, emotionally and narratively driven, visually
breathtaking with each individual frame, and NOT about the guns
and bombs and machinations of war, but about the true "engines"
that drive the men behind a war: the body, the mind, the heart, and
the soul. Inner-conflict over outer-resolution.
Every performance by an actor in this film is mesmerizing, EVERY
one. The orchestral score and Malaysian choir songs permeate
the ear and haunt the mind to the point that they brand themselves
into the listener's very soul. Each scene, setting, shot, or frame of
film is rich with the colors, textures, weight and framing of the
contrasts between life and war. Every character's thought, gesture,
line of dialogue, personal subplot, drop of sweat or blood, and
contribution to the over-all story-line, the very film itself, rings
completely TRUE to the audience. And all of these elements,
when combined, wash over the right viewer, filling every pore, every
fiber of their being, COMPLETELY. You WILL feel.
There is a line in the film, delivered by James Caviezel, as Private
Witt, in which he asks, "Why does nature vie with itself?" And in
turn I ask (myself), how often do we look at a beautiful garden, a
majestic forest, or even our own front lawn, and not see the
struggles for life being fought there everyday, and then reflect
those same struggles within ourselves, within our own growing
spirits? We CHOOSE not to until thrown into battle, into war, or a
personal danger so immanent we are forced to. This is just one
question that The Thin Red Line posed to me and dared me to
answer....... long after I'd left the theater.
11/10 A beautiful and horrific masterpiece.