[For Veterans Day, I’ll be AmericanStudying five examples of texts that can help us remember and engage with veterans’ experiences from five of our defining wars. Leading up to a weekend post on 21st century veterans’ stories!]
On the film and performance that capture the spectrum and significance of
veterans’ experiences.
There are no shortage of memorable
World War II stories in our national narratives—of course there are the
overarching narratives like The
Greatest Generation and Rosie the
Riveter; there are the explicitly and centrally celebratory texts, such
as in films like Midway or Saving Private Ryan; the more complex mixtures of celebration and
realism, films like From Here to Eternity
or Flags of Our Fathers; and the
very explicitly critical and satirical accounts, as in the novels Catch-22 and Slaughterhouse Five. One
could even argue, with some accuracy, that if there is any single event or era
that doesn’t need additional reinforcing in our national consciousness, it is
World War II. And similarly, one could argue that if there’s any group of
American films that can’t be considered generally under-exposed or –remembered,
even if some have waned in popularity or awareness over time, it’d be those
that won the Academy Award for Best Picture.
Well, I guess I like a challenge,
because I’m here to argue that a World War II-centered film that in 1947 won
not only Best Picture but also Director, Actor, Supporting Actor, Screenplay,
Editing, and Music has become a much too forgotten and underappreciated
American text. [NOTE: I initially wrote this post more than a decade ago, and I
hope and believe that this is no longer as much the case.] That film was The
Best Years of Our Lives, William Wyler’s adaptation of MacKinlay
Kantor’s 1945 novel Glory for Me about three returning World War II
veterans and their
experiences attempting to re-adapt to civilian life on the
home front. It’s a far from perfect film, and features some schmaltzy sections
that, perhaps, feel especially dated at more than sixty years’ remove and have
likely contributed to its waning appeal. But it also includes some complex and
powerful moments, and a significant number of them can be attributed directly
to Wyler’s most famous and important casting choice: his decision to cast
former paratrooper Harold
Russell, an amateur actor who had lost both of his hands in a training
accident, in the role of Homer Parrish, a similarly disabled vet with hooks
replacing his hands. Homer’s relationship with the
extremely supportive Wilma (played by Cathy O’Donnell) offers its share
of the schmaltz, but in other ways his character and performance are much more
dark and complicated, affecting the emotions through their realism and
sensitivity rather than just overt heartstring-tugging.
That’s especially true of the scene
that stood out to me most when I watched the film (as a college student in the
late 1990s) and that has stuck with me ever since. Homer, once a star high
school quarterback who was used to being watched and admired by younger boys in
that earlier role, is attempting to work on a project in his garage but
struggling greatly with his prostheses; he knows that a group of neighborhood
boys are spying on him in fascination and horror but tries to ignore their
presence. He can’t do so, however, and in a burst of anger releases much of
what he has been dealing with since his injuries and return, breaking the
garage windows with his hooks and daring the kids to fully engage with who and
what he has become. The moment, big and emotional as it is, feels as unaffected
as it gets, and manages to do what few of those more well-known World War II
stories can: celebrating and critiquing in equal measure, recognizing the
sacrifice and heroism of a Homer while mourning what war does and takes and
destroys. Ultimately the scene, like the film, provides no definite answers, no
straightforward adulation of its veterans nor darkly comic takedown of war
myths, but instead simply asks us to think about what life (in and out of war)
has meant and continues to mean for someone like Harold Russell, and all his
veteran peers.
Indeed, Best Years is ultimately about precisely that—the experiences and
identities of the soldiers themselves, at their best, at their worst, and
everywhere in between. On Veteran’s Day, and on every other day as well, I
think it’d be ideal to focus not on wars at all, horrific and cold and
impersonal and, yes, hellish as they always are, but on remembering those
Americans whose lives were and continue to be so impacted by these
experiences—not least, I have to add, because I think we’d be a lot less cavalier
about starting wars if we did so. Special post this weekend,
Ben
PS. What
do you think? Veterans’ stories and/or texts you’d share?
PPS. For another take on Best Years, make sure to check out my wife Vaughn Joy's excellent Review Roulette newsletter!
No comments:
Post a Comment