Wednesday, December 2, 2009

Shared Sacrifice why War Movies Suck

Nixon over at LT Nixon Rants wonders why Iraq and Afghanistan war movies are duds.

The reason is unlike in World War II (and Vietnam) there is no actual shared sacrifice amongst the American people. WWII was a shared burden across the entire American populace. There is no shared sacrifice and no shared burden during the last 8 years.

418500 Americans lost their lives in WWII and millions more were injured. Additionally, the American People aided in the War effort, scrimped and saved, worked with the Department of War and in the Armed Forces and knew large swaths of the American populace also sacrificed and suffered.

While, today a vast majority of Americans do not have even a tangential connection to either theater of Operations. This is why no one cares about War deaths, or TBI and homeless Veterans.

And those making movies are even further removed. No modern "star" today would even consider dropping a Hollywood career for service. There aren't a Vic Mature or Wayne Morris amongst today's stars. No today's Hollywood elite mimic World War II Chicken Hawks Ronald Reagan and John Wayne and pretend to be in the military...

Then, when the war ended most Americans had a real connection to it and knew something about war and the military. They knew how to portray the war and soldiers. Today's Americans and Hollywooders don't and it shows.

Update:
I left an updated comment over at Nixon's. It's a line, from the documentary Gunner Palace, which sums up the American publics' (shopping not withstanding) view of Iraq:
"Someone being sympathetic to this? I don't know if I'd be sympathetic if I wasn't in the Army. After you watch this, you're gonna go get your popcorn out of the microwave and talk about what I said, and you'll forget me by the end of this.” ~SGT Beatty, Gunner Palace.

6 comments:

Serving Patriot said...

Well, if we could get our Majority Dems to work on sharing the sacrifice... even is a small way a la Obey's surtax... that would be a start.

Too bad even Obey does not expect to see his legislation make it to a real floor debate, much less into a bill.

Sigh.
SP

ran said...

Hey! After 9/11 our President asked we civilians to do our duty and go shopping. We did our patriotic duty for seven straight years until we no longer could. But of course we get no credit for the hard sacrifices we made. We can only shop for so long, Grunge!

Grung_e_Gene said...

And yes Ran the update is directed at you because I know you buy (or at least to) that Un-American Trader Joe Crappy Popcorn...

Anonymous said...

Just look at that little shit with his nose up in the air.
I guess he can't see the forest for the trees. Racial harmony has deteriorated at least 50% since Obama has become president. His policies are the reason so many are out of work and his policies are the reason racial harmony is on the downturn. Blacks, not all blacks, but many blacks apparently think that now they can justify the hate they feel for whites, although many marry whites, Asians and Hispanics.

I am 45 years old. I had many black friends when I was young. My friends were just every day people like us.

Younger blacks today carry a hate in them for the injustices of 200 years ago.

You have the likes of Jesse Jackson, Al Sharpton, Farrakhan etc. inciting the hate so they can live large without really working.

Then of course we once again have the Black Panthers hate group who are just the black version of the KKK

Grung_e_Gene said...

Rude and A Ass:
Then of course we once again have the Black Panthers hate group who are just the black version of the KKK

How many white people have been lynched by the Black Panthers?

Anonymous said...

The men of Gunner Palace come home in the new film How to Fold a Flag.

http://www.howtofoldaflag.com