Flags Of Our Fathers

Action, Drama, History, War

Jesse Bradford	Rene Gagnon
Jamie Bell	Ralph Ignatowski
Paul Walker	Hank Hansen
Ryan Phillippe	John "Doc" Bradley
Barry Pepper	Mike Strank
Adam Beach	Ira Hayes
Michael Ahl	Senator
James E. Ash	Admiral
Gunnarr Baldursson	Soldier
Tom Beaver	Military Captain
John Benjamin Hickey	Keyes Beech
John Slattery	Bud Gerber
Robert Patrick	Colonel Chandler Johnson
Neal McDonough	Captain Severance

Director	Clint Eastwood
Producer	Clint Eastwood; Steven Spielberg; Robert Lorenz
Writer	Paul Haggis; William Broyles, Jr.; William Broyles Jr.

On the Frontline, There's No Time for Fear.

For 70,000 marines who fought with bombs blasting and guns blazing, the bloody battle for Iwo Jima was more than the turning point of World War II; it was the defining moment in their lives.

In the epic that The New York Times calls "a sweeping spectacle," Academy Award-winning director Clint Eastwood taps into the single greatest emotional truth of warfare: soldiers may fight for their country, but they die for their friends. Hailed by critics as "a film of awesome power and blistering provocation, an amazing feat" (Peter Travers, Rolling Stone), Flags Of Our Fathers is a powerful true story of heroism and bravery that should be shared and remembered.

Thematically ambitious and emotionally complex, Clint Eastwood's Flags of Our Fathers is an intimate epic with much to say about war and the nature of heroism in America. Based on the non-fiction bestseller by James Bradley (with Ron Powers), and adapted by Million Dollar Baby screenwriter Paul Haggis (Jarhead screenwriter William Broyles Jr. wrote an earlier draft that was abandoned when Eastwood signed on to direct), this isn't so much a conventional war movie as it is a thought-provoking meditation on our collective need for heroes, even at the expense of those we deem heroic. In telling the story of the six men (five Marines, one Navy medic) who raised the American flag of victory on the battle-ravaged Japanese island of Iwo Jima on February 23rd, 1945, Eastwood takes us deep into the horror of war (in painstakingly authentic Iwo Jima battle scenes) while emphasizing how three of the surviving flag-raisers (played by Adam Beach, Ryan Phillippe, and Jesse Bradford) became reluctant celebrities – and resentful pawns in a wartime publicity campaign – after their flag-raising was immortalized by Associated Press photographer Joe Rosenthal in the most famous photograph in military history.

As the surviving flag-raisers reluctantly play their public roles as "the heroes of Iwo Jima" during an exhausting (but clearly necessary) wartime bond rally tour, Flags of Our Fathers evolves into a pointed study of battlefield valor and misplaced idolatry, incorporating subtle comment on the bogus nature of celebrity, the trauma of battle, and the true meaning of heroism in wartime. Wisely avoiding any direct parallels to contemporary history, Eastwood allows us to draw our own conclusions about the Iwo Jima flag-raisers and how their postwar histories (both noble and tragic) simultaneously illustrate the hazards of exploited celebrity and society's genuine need for admirable role models during times of national crisis. Flags of Our Fathers defies the expectations of those seeking a more straightforward war-action drama, but it's richly satisfying, impeccably crafted film that manages to be genuinely patriotic (in celebrating the camaraderie of soldiers in battle) while dramatizing the ultimate futility of war. Eastwood's follow-up film, Letters from Iwo Jima, examines the Iwo Jima conflict from the Japanese perspective. --Jeff Shannon