Red letter day for 'Iwo Jima'

War is hell." That's the beat Hollywood has been drumming for almost eight decades. From its earliest conception in 1930 with the remarkable adaptation of "All Quiet on the Western Front," through Steven Spielberg's 1998 blockbuster "Saving Private Ryan" and beyond, Tinseltown has delivered many convincing and harrowing depictions of combat. Almost all such films have been interpreted as 'antiwar,' and an elite few stand out above the rest. "Letters from Iwo Jima," Clint Eastwood's Oscar-nominated masterpiece, belongs in that elite cadre of pressing, beautiful and honest war movies. In the very least, it is one of the most boldly humanist war movies ever made.

The very premise of "Letters" is a daring move. The film is a companion piece to Eastwood's "Flags of our Fathers," which concerned the battle of Iwo Jima in World War II and the famous photograph of the American Flag that was taken there. While "Flags" took, like almost all Hollywood war movies, the American perspective, "Letters" is exclusively about the Japanese side of the battle.

The colors of "Letters" are deftly muted, giving the whole film a grayed-out appearance fitting its somber mood. In some ways, the film resembles a memory; indeed, the film is framed by the modern discovery of the Japanese letters that give the film its name. Periodically, we get glimpses into the Japanese soldiers' pasts, and their need to remember the battle — and those who fought in it on either side — is a pressing theme of the film. The Japanese soldiers will not be hailed as heroes by American audiences, but their sacrifices can certainly be respected and even admired. In the very least, the film allows us to better appreciate what the war was like for our enemies. We can perhaps even begin to comprehend war's true nature without having experienced it ourselves.

The battle of Iwo Jima is a complicated affair, but Eastwood's direction steers the film away from a tactical, documentarian portrayal of the battle and instead finds focus on the soldiers and officers who tenaciously defended the island. Ken Watanabe (perhaps best known for playing a similar character in "The Last Samurai") plays the commanding officer, General Kuribayashi, an American-educated man whose conception of honor is at once rational and ideological. He is an indomitable leader who struggles against the narrow, suicidal inclinations of the traditional Bushido warrior-code (to the chagrin of his immediate subordinates) but is ultimately unable to escape its misguided tenets. Watanabe's controlled but expressive performance dominates the film; he is larger than life, a brilliant mind lost to the mud, rock and sand of the doomed island of Iwo Jima.

Though Kuribayashi is the most fully realized character in the film, a democratic Eastwood wisely spends much of the film following Japanese grunts in the fields — or, more accurately, tunnels — of battle. Saigo, a recently-conscripted baker (Kazunari Ninomiya), is therefore central to the film, and it is primarily through his eyes that we see the true nature of war and appreciate the conditions under which the Japanese fought. It helps that Saigo does not want to be there. He has no pretense of honor and glory but simply wants to survive long enough to someday see his child. That desperation is apparent throughout the film as we follow Saigo through the cramped tunnels and past overzealous officers. Saigo is a familiar type of character in war movies — the type which is often derided as a coward. Yet here, he is utterly human.

The transformation of cowardice into humanity is a direct result of the film's unusual perspective. The fact that all the protagonists are sworn enemies of America — indeed, that their mission is to kill as many Americans as possible — presents a problem for Eastwood, as well as for the American viewer. We cannot sympathize with their cause, we cannot root for their victory and we cannot feel sad at their defeat. Every success for them is a defeat for us; yet the characters' evident humanity cries out for our sympathy and even support.

This moral dilemma is actually one of the film's strongest points, and what serves to separate it from most American war movies. Even though we intuitively abhor violence, it also thrills us. "Saving Private Ryan" depicts the terrible cost of war, but only in between action-packed scenes of carnage that audiences adore. We silently howl in joy when an American sniper blows off a German's head or an enemy tank is blown to smithereens. Like the Coliseum-going populace of ancient Rome, we are drawn to violence and gore; that such atrocities are in the name of a noble cause makes such base appetites more acceptable.

In "Letters," on the other hand, we are effectively forbidden to be thrilled by the violence because of the Japanese perspective. Every bullet shot by a Japanese soldier is a bullet shot at one of our own; a Japanese soldier's death helps America's cause. Given that Japan's position in World War II is almost universally accepted as unjust, we cannot permit ourselves to take pleasure in the violence against Americans. At the same time, because of the protagonists' evident humanity, we cannot — as war propagandists did — simply characterize the Japanese as faceless or, worse, monstrous enemies deserving of death.

The violence in "Letters," then, is objective and real, unclouded by national prejudice and, most importantly, unenjoyable. In that way, unlike other war movies that dwell on violence and use it to entertain, "Letters" draws you into its setting, characters and history with potency, urgency and honesty, resulting in perhaps the most rewarding cinematic experience of the year.