Over at The Big Picture, Patrick Goldstein spent some time revisiting the three “bona fide” war films to win the Oscar for Best Picture (in the last 40 years): “Patton,” “The Deer Hunter” and “Platoon.” He notes that each of those films, when adjusted for inflation, grossed over $300 million, $280 million and $160 million respectively. We all know where “The Hurt Locker”‘s tally sits.
What he took away from another look was that each film captures modern day ambivalence toward war, which really, the best of war cinema does. Which reminds me, I caught “Black Hawk Down” again on cable earlier this week (a brilliant film), and certainly the point is driven home there, though in more camouflaged strokes. When Tom Sizemore sarcastically quips, “Just get it over with,” in response to a young soldier screaming, “They’re going to get us killed,” any notion that the film uses high octane tropes to drum up a sense of “duty” or American flag-waving quickly flies out the window.
But I digress. All of that is kind of inherent in the drive to make a war film, unless you’re talking about a golden age period that saw the likes of John Wayne (who Goldstein reminds “ducked out of the fighting himself”) standing up, larger than life, to the identity-less enemies of a nation.