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A lot has been said about this movie very recently, so we took a slightly different approach this time and brought on DIF Guru Matt "emfayder" Vayda to sit next to Eddie and talk Army with us.
Unfortunately, we do spend a lot of time just being our usual selves. We tried to be smart and topical, we did!
I'd like to dedicate this episode to the fallen members of my unit from 4th Battalion, 27th Field Artillery Regiment, 1st Armored Division, Baumholder, Germany.
Staff Sgt. Kevin C. Kimmerly
Spc. Christopher J. Holland
Staff Sgt. Esau G. Patterson Jr.
Staff Sgt. Jeffrey F. Dayton
Sgt. Ryan M. Campbell
Spc. James L. Beckstrand
Spc. Justin B. Schmidt
Pfc. Ryan E. Reed
Pfc. Norman Darling
Pfc. Jeremy Ricardo Ewing
Now...
Need a copy? Pick up the DVD or Blu-Ray at the Down in Front Store
The Hurt Locker on IMDB
Quotes from writer Mark Boal's Playboy article The Man in the Bomb Suit
The opening quote is from War Is A Force That Gives Us Meaning, by Chris Hedges, an excerpt of which can be found here
My job, Cannon Crewmember
Eddie's job, Ammunition Specialist
Camelbacks have largely replaced canteens for carrying water
Last edited by Matt Vayda (2010-04-07 21:24:50)
Oh man, you guys! I just had this from Netflix last week, but I already sent it back. I really like you guys and your site, but I wish you would put a schedule out so we know what movies are coming.
Hm. Anyone else want a calendar?
Oh I dunno Teague I've only been telling you you need one for the past year.
I would be very much down for a calender.
I'm curious what people think of our opinion of the movie. Matt and I did wax nostalgic about the Army, sure, but I think we landed on a solid critique of the movie and I'd like to know what our listeners think about the film.
Well I only got about halfway through the movie so far, (got really weighed down by all the military reminiscing and technicality, not really my thing) but from what I've heard so far (In addition to what I heard from the anniversary show) it seems like you guys started out saying that this movie got a lot of things right and things were really realistic and all that. But as the movie went along the primary thing I noticed was that when it came to the nitty gritty details (guns, vehicles etc.) you guys were pretty much in agreement that they were accurate (Except for the youtube reference and the uniforms...). But nearly everytime someone (Usually Teague) brought up "So is this how the real EOD would do it?" or "So is this how it would really happen?" I heard an overwhelming amount of "Oh no, that's completely a movie fabrication." or more more usual, "Oh hell no."
Which leads me to wonder, how much of this movie is actually right?? (I mean on a character level, as a representation of what actually goes on over there)
Again you guys probably wrap it up nicely in the last half, but since you asked, I wanted to get that out there.
Oh and hells yes to the calender. I'm sure I've asked about this before...numerously.
Link doesn't do anything for me.
Right on, I spent a whole lot of time over there transporting stuff around with these.
I've got some of my pictures from over there on my Webshots account. Feel free to poke around.
Lemme try that again.
Ha! Nice! There's a photo or two of me driving that fucker around. My favorite feature was that you could reduce or increase the tire pressure WHILE DRIVING IT.
If a HumVee can be used for Civvy use, so should that.
My favorite modern war movie is Blackhawk Down. I love the quote from it. "Politics go out the door the minute the first bullet flys by your head."
Twig: You should read the book. I brought my copy with me over there and read it so much it fell apart.
I forgot about this in the show, but for a better idea of my deployment, track down a copy of Gunner Palace (I've linked to it in the store). It's a documentary of a sister unit of mine (2/3 FA) shot about the same time I was there.
The thing about our deployment was that we didn't do a lot of Field Artillery stuff. Some guys got to fire rounds, but for the most part we were assigned to security and patrol type duties, duties more in line with what you might ask an MP (Military Police) unit to do. The early days of the war were a lot like that, units getting re-tasked to fill a role they hadn't trained for. Hopefully that's changed by now, but it wouldn't surprise me if it hasn't.
I'm not a military guy, so I can't speak to veracity or whatever. But as a movie guy — er, guy who watches movies and dreams of making them — I'll say that "The Hurt Locker" never really clicked for me. And it was for reasons you guys did a good job of articulating, I think. It's structured like a character piece, but the characters are so tightly wound as to be inscrutable. Like you guys said, parts of the movie are so freakin' suspenseful I nearly gave myself a cramp while I was watching it. And the bit with the Capri Sun was really nice. But overall, as a film … I've seen better. Seen worse too, but I've seen better.
Here's my thing about the Iraq war: "Apocalypse Now" was released in 1979, but production started on it in 1976, less than a year after the fall of Saigon. We're now nearly seven years past the official "end of major combat operations" in Iraq, or whatever you want to call it, but I don't think anybody right now can unambiguously state whether we've won or lost. I think that lack of a definitive conclusion one way or the other makes it hard for anybody to tell a story that's in the time and place of the Iraq war without being about the time and place of the Iraq war. I think "The Hurt Locker" did about as good a job as any film I know of being set in Iraq but not specifically about Iraq, but it was still tied down by geopolitics.
If it'd been up to me, I'd rather the whole subplot with the kid, Beckham, had been cut. Or, contrariwise, I wish it'd been a breaking point for James of some kind. Instead, it seemed to me that James got obsessed with the kid and made a series of, like, criminally bad choices because of it, and then … well, life goes on. I wanted to see some consequences from that, on a character level if not on a plot level.
Anyway, yeah. Good commentary.
Oh, and hey: a few years back I got to attend a private screening of "Gunner Palace" that Jon Powers held while he was promoting War Kids Relief. Matt's absolutely right: It's a film worth watching.
Didn't care much for this one (film, not the commentary).
I watched this and Body of Lies in a sort of double bill and found both to be the very similar - they're both wishy washy films too blatantly skirting around very current issues presenting a story about... well nothing really.
THL seems like a series of vignettes, the best of which is the opening and the worst is the encounter with the mercenaries, which suffers from very bad direction and editing - I can't believe Oscars were handed out for this shoddy work. The two mercenaries that survive the initial attack simply disappear entirely. The camera almost deliberately shoots around them, despite the fact that they are right there in the ditch with them, instead choosing to focus on our heroes who have gone from soldiers to supersoldiers. At one point they're attacked from the rear and it's like the two extra guys with weapons have evaporated. I keep thinking, 'wait, what happened to the other guys?' and there I am distracted for the remainder of the scene.
With the ending, I felt the entire film was rendered moot.
Last edited by redxavier (2010-04-16 12:20:11)
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