The Good
This is an interesting film that shows the hell of war for everyone involved in it.
The Bad
Letters from Iwo Jima is the second part of Clint Eastwood’s World War II opus that he began with Flags of Our Fathers. The first film focused on the raising of the flag at Iwo Jima, and how the need for U.S. support of that war created heroes where there actually weren’t any. Letters from Iwo Jima shows the Japanese perspective of this film. What is initially thought to be a route (with the U.S. forces seemingly able to cherry pick the island of Iwo Jima) turns into 40 days of hard fighting for everyone involved. This film, thankfully, doesn’t take sides and rather simply presents us a heartfelt look at what our “enemy” was going through.
Mainly focusing on General Tadamichi Kuribayashi played by Ken Watanabe, we also get a chance to see what other soldiers were going through. We see hardened fighters and how they got that way. We also see young boys that were just called to combat because of their age. While I honestly think that Flags of Our Fathers is the best war movie that Dreamworks has ever made, I really think that Letters from Iwo Jima does a fine job of showing how amidst great battles, there can also be deep humanity.
Features
Red Sun, Black Sand: The Making Of Letters from Iwo Jima
Basically, this is an EPK for this movie. We get a look at the day to day grind that Clint Eastwood and Co. faced while they were on the set. The shooting of various battle scenes in presented, the actors give us information on their characters, and Clint Eastwood discusses what drove him to tell two stories about essentially same subject. What I find so interesting is that he had no idea when he got started on this project, just how prescient its story would be years later. If anything, I think this film looks at an older way of combat when it was carried out more by people following orders, than by those who wanted to spread their beliefs and ideologies.
The Faces of Combat: The Cast of Letters from Iwo Jima
Images From the Frontlines
Giving us a montage of photos from the film, I would certainly suggest taking a look at this section if you have the time. It gives us a meditative look at this film. While I love moving images, I also love the feelings and power that still pictures can evoke. Also, there are so many different ways that they can be read. We can think we know what’s going on in a picture, but we can never be sure. In a lot of ways, these still images carried just as much weight as the film itself.
November 2006 World Premiere at Budo-kan in Tokyo and November 2006 Press Conference
Like the War films of old that I am given to review, this supplemental footage seems to be along those lines. We see the audience reaction to the film at the November 2006 World Premiere at Budo-kan in Tokyo, and at the November 2006 Press Conference, there is a back and forth discussion with the cast and crew about Letters from Iwo Jima. I didn’t think there was anything too special about any of this stuff, it just seems like in trying to make this release feel like something special, they have put as many extra features on this DVD as possible.
Video
Widescreen Version presented in a “Letterbox” widescreen format preserving the “scope” aspect ratio of its original theatrical exhibition. Enhanced for Widescreen TVs. This movie obviously doesn’t look as good on Standard DVD as it does in HD. That is simply a given (or at least it should be, anyway). What I will say is that the Standard side really seems to have done a great job of handling all the contrast of the almost black and white images in this desaturated film. Also, in the moments where there was a lot of black on the screen, I didn’t see any white hits that sometimes occur, nor did those portions of the screen seem overly compressed.
Audio
Dolby Digital - Japanese: Dolby Surround 5.1. Close Captioned. As I mentioned in my HD-DVD review (this is the only problem with viewing multiple formats, I find myself repeating things) the film being in Japanese forces us to read the screen and thus use the ambient noises and soundtrack to build our emotional base. In all honesty, I didn’t notice a whole ton of difference between the audio on this side of the disc and the audio on the HD-DVD. While I am sure that had I listened harder, I probably would have found something, I was happy with both ranges that were supplied to me.
Package
This front cover features the sun rising as it silhouettes the shores of Iwo Jima and General Tadamichi Kuribayashi. There is also faded Japanese lettering that adds a nice touch. The back of this disc offers up a description of what Letters from Iwo Jima is about, a Special Features listing, a cast list and technical specs. The two discs that make up this set are stored in one amaray case, and I am glad that Warner Bros. has keep this release very economically packaged.
Final Word
At 140 minutes, I found Letters from Iwo Jima to be quite well done. It is fueled by Clint Eastwood’s skilled direction, and, aside from Ken Watanabe, actors that I had heretofore never seen in a motion picture. At first I was skeptical about this film because Dreamworks has a history of making movies that, in an effort to show us humanity, end up making us side with the nobody in the film. So many times I have gone into one of their movies because the subject matter interested me, only to then come out and discover that in trying to be so many things their film ended up being nothing. This was not the case with Letters from Iwo Jima. Eastwood shows us an array of characters but he’s also not afraid to show the inevitable brutality of combat.
Clint Eastwood seems to have moved at a very measured pace while making this movie. I never felt that he weaved in too many stories, or that all of the characters got confusing. While I might feel that Flags of Our Fathers is a better movie, that might have more to do with it relating to me and the United States’ current geopolitical situation. If you are a DVD collector your collection is sorely lacking if it doesn’t have both of the war films that Eastwood has created.
Letters From Iwo Jima was released December 19, 2006.
