There are about a billion and a half films about World War II, and there are many more that aren’t about the War itself, but set during the war, with its atmosphere winding through the narrative like a thick fog. While like most people (and ALL men) I love a good WWII film, I have often wondered what ground left there is to cover.

For reasons unclear to me, director Clint Eastwood, hot off his Oscar winning Best Picture Million Dollar Baby decided that one particular battle of World War II intrigued him enough to make not one, but two films about it – each portraying a different side of the war. Released mere months apart, and filmed concurrently, Flags Of Our Fathers is about the American taking of Iwo Jima, the controversy of the most famous photograph of all time, and the shape of that on American culture for years to come. The other film, Letters From Iwo Jima focuses on the Japanese resistance trying to prevent the loss of the same island. The latter has been nominated for Best Picture this year.

Flags Of Our Fathers was the first released to theatres, and now the first released on DVD just in time for Oscar season catch-up. Is it worth seeing? In a word: Yes. For a lot more words: continue reading.

The first thing that Flags Of Our Fathers gets right is that it doesn’t spend the bulk of its running time on the taking of Iwo Jima itself. It shows the troops being shown the strategy of the maneuver, explained to why they are striking there, we see some private intimate moments of the main characters and their landing on the shores. The battle itself is extremely lengthy and shows effectively that the battle was not glamorous with an unsettling amount of casualties. Eventually, they take the island.

This is all done within forty-five minutes. This is all just a lead-in to the actual story.

As is popularly known, photographer Joe Rosenthal snapped a photo of six men raising the United States flag when they reached the summit of Mt. Suribachi. The photo is one of the most recognizable (some sources say the most printed of all time) but the not as widely known fact is that it was raised well before they took the island, and the flag photographed wasn’t the first flag raised. With the photograph quickly becoming the popular symbol for patriotism back home, it was ordered that the soldiers in the photo be returned home to tour as national heroes, and help raise money for the war effort. It’s this part farce/part misunderstanding that the remainder of Flags Of Our Fathers focuses itself on – and it’s incredible.

All war buffs, and hell even advertisers, know that the marketing and propaganda machine during WWII was more powerful than the armies themselves. This fact is on full display here, while we follow Navy Corpsmans John Bradley (Ryan Phillippe, Crash (2004)), and Marines Rene Gagnon (Jesse Bradford, Swimfan), and Ira Hayes (Adam Beach, Windtalkers), as they go on their promotion tour feeling as though they are anything but heroes. This is most apparent in Ira Hayes, who can’t stand that one of his friends in the photograph had been misidentified, and none of his superiors see fit to make public the error.

Eastwood’s directorial signature is all over this film. As any follower of his would realize that like most of his other films, this story focuses on a small group of people surrounded by near-epic circumstances. The three leads are all strong actors, wonderfully portraying their real-life counterparts. Particularly rewarding to watch is the grudging relationship between Gagnon and Hayes which is both historically accurate and completely convincing. In fact Adam Beach’s performance as Ira Hayes is incredible, fully displaying the Marine’s desire for anonymity and his struggle against alcoholism and PTSD, but mostly for the unbearable guilt that he bore for not publicly revealing the identity of his deceased friend, Harlon Block. As usual, Eastwood’s film focuses on the individual characters as mush as it does the story.

As far as how the film is shot, well it looks beautiful. Eastwood knows how to perfectly frame a scene so both the foreground and background have detail worth paying attention to. However, I found that there seemed to be an over-reliance on CGI in both the battle scenes and at some of the recreated “stops” that the three men made. At times this is a bit distracting and removed me from the scenes. Regardless though, Flags Of Our Fathers has an awesome look. This is made all the better when mated with Eastwood’s own subdued score. The music is only used to underline the film, not to progress it.

I missed this while it was still in theatres, and I regret that now. It’s an exceptional movie which has only made my desire to see Letters From Iwo Jima (as of this writing, the only Best Picture nominee I haven’t seen) all the more insatiable. If you are anywhere close to being on the fence about seeing Flags Of Our Fathers, get off of it. You need to see this movie; I can’t imagine it disappointing anyone.

As for the DVD on the other hand…

The DVD Presentation
Presented in anamorphic widescreen (a separate full-frame release is also available) Flags Of Our Fathers looks and sounds perfect. It isn’t a colorful film, but the dark pallet still comes across beautifully with deep blacks and blue highlights. The grey hued battle sequences particularly are very strong on this transfer. Likewise, the audio is incredible. During the battle scenes the English 5.1 surround mix has bullets whizzing by and bombs exploding all around. It’s the experience that you would expect from a modern war film, but it’s far more encompassing than an average mix. A French 5.1 mix is available as well, and subtitles are available in both English and Spanish for those that require them.

And the Extras Are?
When the DVD is first inserted, non-anamorphic trailers for Oscar hopefuls Letters From Iwo Jima and Babel auto-play. Aside from this, there is nothing. Not even a trailer for the main feature.

There isn’t even a chapter selection. It’s that bone dry. And you know what this means…

The Bottom Line
War film fans are going to want Flags Of Our Fathers in their collections. It’s a great movie with a stellar cast that nicely covers the politics of war, as well as one of the key turning points of World War II. I definitely recommend that everyone hold off in purchasing it though. With absolutely no extras on this DVD, it should be obvious to everyone that a double-dip is waiting just around the corner, no doubt waiting for the Oscar results on its sister film Letters From Iwo Jima. If you haven’t seen it, this DVD makes for a fine rental experience, but save your dough for a more complete package.