Werner's rather tepid 6 out of 10 evaluation of THE FIGHTING SEABEES notwithstanding (I'd have given the film much higher, but that is just opinion), the allegation that Wayne failed to perform military service during World War II owing to "disabling restrictions" is simply not true. Accounts vary in accounting for his lack of military service, but none of them have to do with disabilities of any kind. As a married man with four children, he was exempt from the draft. His daughter Ayssa reports that Wayne was eager for military service but that pressure from Republic Pictures (with whom he was making enormously profitable films) convinced him not to volunteer for military service. A less flattering picture emerges from Gary Wills JOHN WAYNE'S America: THE POLITICS OF CELEBRITY in which evidence seems to indicate that Wayne (who was no physical coward by any stretch of the imagination) made a complex decision based on his growing stature in the film industry, his value as a propaganda symbol, his increasing paycheck, and the fact that he found film-making so rewarding. Whether an outside observer finds this an appealing portrait or not, there is ample evidence to suggest that Wayne always regretted thereafter not having served on active duty.
Reviews
7 Reviews
A Night to Remember
(1958)
easy solutions
3 December 2004
Roy Ward Baker's masterly docudrama still holds up well even after nearly a half century. It is a far more historically accurate, and broader-scoped version than the James Cameron 1998 epic. Although I thoroughly enjoyed the latter, the former still wins the prize for historical veracity as well as for dramatic impact.
Les from Brighton asks a couple of questions and poses a few comments meriting response:
Q: With a huge iceberg nearby would it not have been obvious to run the Titanic aground upon it?
A: Obvious, perhaps, but hardly practical. Icebergs are harder than steel and any attempt to beach an ocean liner on a berg (particularly with nearly perpendicular slopes) would only invite more damage to the vessel. There is some speculation that Titanic might have survived if the lookouts had detected the berg only one minute later than they did. The deck officer would have had no time to attempt evasion and Titanic would have rammed the berg-head on instead of sustaining a glancing blow, which peppered the hull with breaches to sea along her port bow three hundred feet aft. Conceivably, for a head on blow the damage might have been restricted to the first two or so of the first four watertight compartments, which might have allowed Titanic to remain afloat.
Q: In a similar vein on spotting the light on the horizon (the Californian) I would have thought that setting out for it in one of the lifeboats manned by as many beefy rowers as they could cram into it might have been a good way to get its attention.
A: SS Californian was anywhere from ten to fifteen miles from RMS Titanic on the night of the sinking. An oar powered life boat (not built for speed but for capacity) with a full crew can make, perhaps, three to four knots on a flat sea. This would mean, roughly, two and a half to four hours for even a beefy lifeboat crew to reach Californian, even if Californian had been close to Titanic, and even if the boat crew had the strength and endurance to pull at maximum speed for the entire time. Titanic struck the iceberg at 11h30 on 14 April and sank at 02h20 on the 15th, slightly under two and a half hours between impact and foundering. There was not enough time to attempt a rescue effort along those lines, and the boat needed for it was better used to get passengers off Titanic.
Q: On the other hand had I been aboard I may have been running around like the rest
A: There was very little running around. The crew of Titanic were unpracticed in evacuation procedures, but they were highly disciplined. They loaded the boats and launched them as quickly and efficiently as they could, but the boats were nowhere near capacity when crew launched them. Walter Lord suggests that one of the factors contributing to the high death rate among passengers (there was room in the lifeboats for 1200 passengers and crew, but only 714 survived) was not necessarily that the large number of steerage passengers were deliberately kept from getting to the boat decks, but that few crew members took the initiative to try encouraging steerage passengers to go the boat decks. Even if a few crew members made the attempt to drive passengers to the weather decks, however, most passengers making it to the deck found it too cold and uncomfortable and simply turned around to go back to the warmth of below decks until it was too late.
Les from Brighton asks a couple of questions and poses a few comments meriting response:
Q: With a huge iceberg nearby would it not have been obvious to run the Titanic aground upon it?
A: Obvious, perhaps, but hardly practical. Icebergs are harder than steel and any attempt to beach an ocean liner on a berg (particularly with nearly perpendicular slopes) would only invite more damage to the vessel. There is some speculation that Titanic might have survived if the lookouts had detected the berg only one minute later than they did. The deck officer would have had no time to attempt evasion and Titanic would have rammed the berg-head on instead of sustaining a glancing blow, which peppered the hull with breaches to sea along her port bow three hundred feet aft. Conceivably, for a head on blow the damage might have been restricted to the first two or so of the first four watertight compartments, which might have allowed Titanic to remain afloat.
Q: In a similar vein on spotting the light on the horizon (the Californian) I would have thought that setting out for it in one of the lifeboats manned by as many beefy rowers as they could cram into it might have been a good way to get its attention.
A: SS Californian was anywhere from ten to fifteen miles from RMS Titanic on the night of the sinking. An oar powered life boat (not built for speed but for capacity) with a full crew can make, perhaps, three to four knots on a flat sea. This would mean, roughly, two and a half to four hours for even a beefy lifeboat crew to reach Californian, even if Californian had been close to Titanic, and even if the boat crew had the strength and endurance to pull at maximum speed for the entire time. Titanic struck the iceberg at 11h30 on 14 April and sank at 02h20 on the 15th, slightly under two and a half hours between impact and foundering. There was not enough time to attempt a rescue effort along those lines, and the boat needed for it was better used to get passengers off Titanic.
Q: On the other hand had I been aboard I may have been running around like the rest
A: There was very little running around. The crew of Titanic were unpracticed in evacuation procedures, but they were highly disciplined. They loaded the boats and launched them as quickly and efficiently as they could, but the boats were nowhere near capacity when crew launched them. Walter Lord suggests that one of the factors contributing to the high death rate among passengers (there was room in the lifeboats for 1200 passengers and crew, but only 714 survived) was not necessarily that the large number of steerage passengers were deliberately kept from getting to the boat decks, but that few crew members took the initiative to try encouraging steerage passengers to go the boat decks. Even if a few crew members made the attempt to drive passengers to the weather decks, however, most passengers making it to the deck found it too cold and uncomfortable and simply turned around to go back to the warmth of below decks until it was too late.
The Basket
(1999)
disagreement with uscoa
26 November 2004
Uscoa from Denver has it precisely wrong. I reviewed the film for IMDb in 1999 when I worked a graduate student at Washington State University, not too far from the shooting location. I was honored by an e-mail reply from the director, Rich Cowan. My comments then still stand. "The Basket" is a glorious film, beautifully photographed, acted with purpose, and suffers only from minor historical gaffes which are entirely forgivable. This film is a superb example of the great things which can be done in independent cinema with regional and local talent. The Pacific Northwest can be very proud of this project. The film may still be available on VHS, although I had to search a bit to find my copy. It was worth every penny.
The Passion of the Christ
(2004)
The very best film I will never see again.
16 April 2004
Mel Gibson's violent vision of Christ's passion neither exploitive nor excessive. It is hardly a "'Texas Chainsaw Massacre' on Golgotha", but it is grueling enough. Although crafted from Gibson's unique perspective as a pre-Vatican II Catholic, "Passion" seems to have resonated with many viewers from widely differing sectarian backgrounds. I write as a traditional Catholic and I did not find the film overly wrought with wretched excess (well, the crow plucking out the eye of the "bad" thief on the cross was a bit over the top). What got me most, frankly, was Jim Caviezel's performance as the most accessible and approachably human Christ ever put on screen. The nearly unremitting horror of Christ's passion is punctuated by a number of rather sweet flashbacks which illustrate a Christ who works up a sweat while carpenting and who cracks jokes with his mom--playfully splashing a bit of water on her as she calls him in for lunch.
THIS Christ is one I'd to know--not only as Lord, God, and Savior--but as a guy I'd like to hang out with.
THIS Christ is one I'd to know--not only as Lord, God, and Savior--but as a guy I'd like to hang out with.
Pearl Harbor
(2001)
Pretty good!
4 June 2001
Although not as scrupulously researched as Richard Fleischer's 1970 TORA! TORA! TORA!, this highly energetic historical actioner boasts virtues which far outweigh its flaws. I found the love story a bit sappy, not up to the standard of Jim Cameron's affectatious TITANIC, and the battle sequences were overly loaded with quick cutting and actors screaming at each other. And drop-dead gorgeous nurses performing medical exams on military recruits? Please. Only in your dreams, pal. Military nurses had other things to do, like taking care of sick and wounded personnel in the hospitals. And why does no one smoke? Tobacco use was ubiquitous among men and women of all ages at the time.
The love story, in fact, seems to have come right out of William Wellman's 1927 WINGS, with Richard Arlen and Buddy Rogers--two American flyers in WWI vying for the affections of Clara Bow. No spoiler intended, but PEARL HARBOR resolves the romantic triangle in a nearly identical fashion.
The good stuff, however, is simply transcendent. Some of the special effects are jaw-dropping beautiful. All 45 thousand tons of battleship USS ARIZONA seem to leap out of the water as she explodes from a Japanese bomb deep in the entrails of her ammunition magazine. Even better, and far sadder, is the slow, excrutiating death of battleship USS OKLAHOMA, as she gracefully, achingly capsizes. The water around OKLAHOMA is strewn with the bodies of dozens of drowned sailors just as the battleship's oversized holiday flag slowly unfurls just below the surface of the water. Navy welders work furiously to cut holes into the thick armor of the capsized battleship and rescue trapped crewmembers inside, only to speed the death of some by venting air out of flooding compartments. Welders manage to open holes just large enough so that drowning sailors can thrust their hands into the open for a few seconds, grasp welders' hands, and then succumb back into the flooded darkness.
The best, I thought, were the hospital sequences depicting military nurses who just simply wanted to run off in hysterics, but grimly took on the task of sorting out mounting casualties for treatment. The hospital scenes were so chaotic, and the resolution of the nurses and doctors so intense, they reminded me of the Omaha beach sequence of SAVING PRIVATE RYAN.
Well done, Michael Bay. I hope to see this one again.
The love story, in fact, seems to have come right out of William Wellman's 1927 WINGS, with Richard Arlen and Buddy Rogers--two American flyers in WWI vying for the affections of Clara Bow. No spoiler intended, but PEARL HARBOR resolves the romantic triangle in a nearly identical fashion.
The good stuff, however, is simply transcendent. Some of the special effects are jaw-dropping beautiful. All 45 thousand tons of battleship USS ARIZONA seem to leap out of the water as she explodes from a Japanese bomb deep in the entrails of her ammunition magazine. Even better, and far sadder, is the slow, excrutiating death of battleship USS OKLAHOMA, as she gracefully, achingly capsizes. The water around OKLAHOMA is strewn with the bodies of dozens of drowned sailors just as the battleship's oversized holiday flag slowly unfurls just below the surface of the water. Navy welders work furiously to cut holes into the thick armor of the capsized battleship and rescue trapped crewmembers inside, only to speed the death of some by venting air out of flooding compartments. Welders manage to open holes just large enough so that drowning sailors can thrust their hands into the open for a few seconds, grasp welders' hands, and then succumb back into the flooded darkness.
The best, I thought, were the hospital sequences depicting military nurses who just simply wanted to run off in hysterics, but grimly took on the task of sorting out mounting casualties for treatment. The hospital scenes were so chaotic, and the resolution of the nurses and doctors so intense, they reminded me of the Omaha beach sequence of SAVING PRIVATE RYAN.
Well done, Michael Bay. I hope to see this one again.
Great "B" monster movie slime! For 8 year olds of all ages!
23 October 1999
"Caltiki", the story of a carnivorous micro-organism in the Mexican jungle grown to terrifying proportions by the radiation of a once-in-every-seventy-millenia comet, enjoys the same sort of on-the-surface "B" movie innocent schlockiness and underlying dark edginess mix which graced legendary Roger Corman's monster and sci fi work in the late fifties. The monster is a product of nature, however, and probably would not have been a problem to modern civilization, but true to the 1950s paradigm of idiot scientists not knowing when to leave well enough alone, a team of doltish researchers actually recover a bit of the slithery beast to play around with. Of course, the scientists discover that the monster considers laboratory induced radiation just as good as the natural kind. The results, as one may imagine, are not good (but are plenty entertaining for us!)
A scene in which a deranged victim of the monster is devoured outright is delightfully disgusting (the monster SLOWLY overwhelms its victim--pulsating and digesting--and then recedes to reveal a denuded skull). The low budget effect equals even the high tech grislyness of Chuck Russel's recent "The Blob". Not at all bad. I saw it when I was eight and it gave me nightmares for years!
A scene in which a deranged victim of the monster is devoured outright is delightfully disgusting (the monster SLOWLY overwhelms its victim--pulsating and digesting--and then recedes to reveal a denuded skull). The low budget effect equals even the high tech grislyness of Chuck Russel's recent "The Blob". Not at all bad. I saw it when I was eight and it gave me nightmares for years!
The Basket
(1999)
Superb visuals
8 September 1999
Splendid feel-good film resonating with rich visuals of the rolling autumn wheat fields of eastern Washington State. Although the historicity of the film is a bit specious--premise: WWI German children are orphaned because their parents were mistakenly killed by U.S. soldiers in the European fighting; fact: No U.S. soldier had even set foot on German soil before the end of the war, hence there was no opportunity to kill German civilians...even by mistake--The Basket is still a beautiful story with solid values and persuasively rendered. On the plus side of the history presented in the scenario, the film does not overstate the rabid anti-German hysteria infecting much of American society during the WWI years.
Jim Swoboda, The director of photography for the Second Unit, also performed as the bass soloist for the Opera sequences. There is one great sequence involving 1918 farm folk, who have never seen an opera, but are seen chatting about one introduced to their children by a new school teacher via Victorola 75 rpm records. In a rapidly shifting montage, the schoolchildren's parents gush over the story line as if it were a favorite TV soap today. It is a hoot!
Jim Swoboda, The director of photography for the Second Unit, also performed as the bass soloist for the Opera sequences. There is one great sequence involving 1918 farm folk, who have never seen an opera, but are seen chatting about one introduced to their children by a new school teacher via Victorola 75 rpm records. In a rapidly shifting montage, the schoolchildren's parents gush over the story line as if it were a favorite TV soap today. It is a hoot!
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