The Thin Red Line

jank

What are peoples opinion on this film. For me this is one of the best film ever made. Its billed as a war movie but its much more then that.
Its more of a spiritual journey on how nature is cruel and evil from conception but there is always light and love, willing to fight this eternal battle

The Thin Red Line itself could be interperted in many ways. Good vs Evil, Life Vs Death, Chaos Vs Tranquility, Man Vs Nature....

The scene where they attack the Japanese camp is one of the best ever. The fog at the start where bullets can be seen but not heard. The roar of each side when they see each other as they cut each other to pieces and the madness ensues with the musical score rising in the background. Topped off with jim caviezel's speach "Where does it come from?, this evil, Whos killing us?, robbing us from life and light?...etc"

What a great piece of cinema.

The characters themselves are brilliant as one could empathise with all of them.
The scene with the cruel Colonel played by Nick Nolte sitting in the Japanese camp deserted after the battle is brilliant! He is all alone and starts to cry realising that mans thurst for ambition and power has robbed him of his humanity. There are so many great scenes in this film I could go on and on.

The one where Jim Caviezel is surrounded and he knows that he is going to die is another one. He plays a much better Jesus Character here then in The Passion.

Any other opinions on the film? I know some where very disappointed with it as it came out the same time as Saving Private Ryan but it is a totally different film to it. That film is great but is just another war film at the end of the day. The thin red line is a film that brings out the philospher in someone, gets people thinking and to me that is very hard to do without being condcending

Oh and before I go the cast is outstanding and the cinematography well Beautifull is a word that doesnt do it justice.

So as you gather I really like this film.:)

fade2black

Great music. Very boring film.

Vokes

I really wanted to like it. But like fade2black, i found it awful boring.

Nice cinematography and soundtrack though.

Retr0gamer

A very pretty but overly pretentious wankfest of a film. It would but you off going to war since it makes it out to be as boring as accountancy and every soldier is a poet or philosopher.

Pigman II

Didn't much care for it as I dislike Jim Caviezel. However that said I did enjoy watching him getting whipped to bits in that film he did about Our Lord.

Hrududu

The first time i saw this film i fell asleep. Anytime anybody brought it up after that i slagged it off, called it dull, pretty with no substance. But then i saw it one night on tv when nothing else was on and i absolutely loved it. Beautiful film, which is a strange thing to say about a film about war.

ekevosu

I'll have to watch it again but first time around I thought it was extremely boring and pretentious....

Lurk

Retr0gamer wrote:

A very pretty but overly pretentious wankfest of a film.

Agree with this, although might...eh..phrase it differently.

sonic juice

I thought it it was the best war film I've ever seen,if you found it boring then maybe dumb and dumber{great film as it is}is more suited to your gamut.

J.R.HARTLEY

of course some people didn't like it, if we all liked the same films the cinema queues would be huge, i liked it but loads of my friends thought it was boring.

fade2black

sonic juice wrote:

I thought it it was the best war film I've ever seen,if you found it boring then maybe dumb and dumber{great film as it is}is more suited to your gamut.

Bit of a snob aren't ya?

TerrorFirmer

I thought it was a decent film. Don't know why so many people found it so boring, I found it quite engaging throughout...maybe it just had a bit too much filler for what should constitute a "war" film for many people, who knows.

I would give it an 8/10.

Lurk

sonic juice wrote:

I thought it it was the best war film I've ever seen,if you found it boring then maybe dumb and dumber{great film as it is}is more suited to your gamut.

Best war film you ever saw? Have you seen many? What about Platoon, The Killing Fields, The Deer Hunter, Schindler's List? Even Saving Private Ryan...it may have been Hollywoodized but it was captivating from start to finish. Apocalypse Now went a little way down the arty-farty route, just like the Thin Red Line, but it's far superior.

Sandwich

Had hopes for it but was disappointed and have to confess, found it a bit boring like earlier posters. Not sure whether Malick was happy wityh it himself, but would really like him to try another war movie as I do think he has great cimematic vision. Love Days of Heaven, and even The New World, not a conventional film by any means, has an odd but special quality to it.
Strikes me as the director who one day could really hit the sweetspot and make an all time great movie. Just didnt come off in Thin Red Line tho.

kaimera

Horribly disappointed with it.

Couldn't remember seeing it and when the bro said he bought it, I thought 'Hey, solid'.

Then I watched it again. Crap.

Pepe LeFrits

kaimera wrote:

Horribly disappointed with it.

Couldn't remember seeing it and when the bro said he bought it, I thought 'Hey, solid'.

Then I watched it again. Crap.

As opposed to 'Hey, mushy... strange DVD'?

J.R.HARTLEY

Lurk wrote:

Best war film you ever saw? Have you seen many? What about Platoon.....

and you lost my support right there.;)
valiant effort to rescue it with the other movies but remember "A good start..."

ObeyGiant

Jeez.

A war movie tries to present something more than a gung-ho vision of war, one where we have intellectual characters who like to, y'know.. think about the deeper meaning of things happening around them rather than two-dimensional characters who like to, y'know... blow things up, and all of a sudden it's labelled pretentious?

I have to side with Sonic Juice - you guys don't know how good you've had it.

Pepe LeFrits

ObeyGiant wrote:

Jeez.

A war movie tries to present something more than a gung-ho vision of war, one where we have intellectual characters who like to, y'know.. think about the deeper meaning of things happening around them rather than two-dimensional characters who like to, y'know... blow things up, and all of a sudden it's labelled pretentious?

I have to side with Sonic Juice - you guys don't know how good you've had it.

Full marks for trying and all that, but I think they forgot that most people watch films to be entertained - I'd more readily recommend this as a cure for insomnia.

Lurk

J.R.HARTLEY wrote:

and you lost my support right there.;)
valiant effort to rescue it with the other movies but remember "A good start..."

well, horses for courses, Mr. Hartley

ObeyGiant

Pepe LeFrits wrote:

Full marks for trying and all that, but I think they forgot that most people watch films to be entertained - I'd more readily recommend this as a cure for insomnia.

I'm all for movies whose sole purpose is 'entertainment', but I believe there's also a place for movies that want to go beyond that and convey ideas. I personally thought Thin Red Line struck an incredible balance between the two: On the one hand, you've got Jim Caviezel waxing lyrical on the nature of evil. On the other, you've got Woody Harrelson having his ass blown off by a grenade.

Goldfinger

I was just checking my watch for the last hour of it.
Tried far too hard to be an existential masterpiece, when it struck me as just being a self-indulgent waste of a great cast. Sorry.
Just my opinion, of course, I know many who thought it really was a masterpiece.

TerrorFirmer

J.R.HARTLEY wrote:

and you lost my support right there.;)
valiant effort to rescue it with the other movies but remember "A good start..."

What?! :eek:

Best. Movie. Ever.

dr.bollocko

I could see why people wouldn't like the Thin Red Line, but I would also say to those people that they are wrong, and they wouldn't know a good movie from a hole in the ground. Its sprawling, well acted, beautifully shot, substantial weighty peice of film making with political overtones and like apocalypse now is a fairly frigging excellent example of an anti-war war movie.
**** platoon.
I dont care what happens to me after I say that.
**** PLATOON! Charlie sheen and his hilarious smell the fart acting ruined this film for me (Why does he still get a job doing anything on tv other than hawking cleaning products), and the Tom Berenger / william Defoe bit, for **** sake, i've seen itchy and scratchy cartoons with more ability to display emotional conflict.
I love war movies, and have watched and re-watched most war movies i have seen, but Platoon is one of the most over-rated.

jank

dr.bollocko wrote:

I could see why people wouldn't like the Thin Red Line, but I would also say to those people that they are wrong, and they wouldn't know a good movie from a hole in the ground. Its sprawling, well acted, beautifully shot, substantial weighty peice of film making with political overtones and like apocalypse now is a fairly frigging excellent example of an anti-war war movie.
**** platoon.
I dont care what happens to me after I say that.
**** PLATOON! Charlie sheen and his hilarious smell the fart acting ruined this film for me (Why does he still get a job doing anything on tv other than hawking cleaning products), and the Tom Berenger / william Defoe bit, for **** sake, i've seen itchy and scratchy cartoons with more ability to display emotional conflict.
I love war movies, and have watched and re-watched most war movies i have seen, but Platoon is one of the most over-rated.

Well said.

J.R.HARTLEY

a little harsh in places but dr.bollocko summed it up nicely

sonic juice

fade2black wrote:

Bit of a snob aren't ya?

Sorry for my late retort,I was busy finishing my evening caviar,Hmmm snob?I'm just defending a film against people who are unschooled in art and poetry transfused into the soul of the film,fair enough if someone doesn't like a film I like,but hell I'm still going to defend it.I enjoyed You,Me and Dupree so maybe I'm just a real erratic snob,Ill try do my job better next time sir.

Retr0gamer

I find the is a thin red line (drum roll ) between a film that tries to do art and a film that tries to hard to be art and comes off as being pretensious. I find the thin red line tries far too hard and ends up as an overly pretentious selfindulgent film. Apocalypse Now is a far superior film in my eyes (hell, a bridge too far and the guns of navarone are better films in my eyes).

J.R.HARTLEY

thats a cymbal clash you want Retr0gamer not a drum roll

TerrorFirmer

Platoon is one of the most famous war films of the 20th century, so I think it's safe to say most people not only like it, but hold it in very high regard.

And Charlie Sheen is great. His dad's in my English lectures - more accurately my "sheen spotting" lectures. Although he's registered under his real name...

Big Nelly

Have to admit the first time I got it out on DVD I fell asleep, have watched it since and good enough film but there is alot better out there. Platoon as mentioned but also Saving Private Ryan was brillant in my eyes.

Some oldies like "The Longest day" and "A bridge too far" are brillant.

Apocalypse Now is also another classic, but everyone is forgetting one of the best and longest war movies......Band of Brothers which is class!!!!:D

dr.bollocko

Charlie sheen is not great. He is one of the most hilariously **** actors I have seen since Ashton frigging Keutcher. He is a parody of himself to be honest.

J.R.HARTLEY

HavoK wrote:

Platoon is one of the most famous war films of the 20th century, so I think it's safe to say most people not only like it, but hold it in very high regard.

it's also safe to say that just because a lot of people hold it in high regard doesn't actually mean it is good. now can we get back to the Thin Red Line instead of "my favourite war movie...."

Big Nelly

J.R.HARTLEY wrote:

it's also safe to say that just because a lot of people hold it in high regard doesn't actually mean it is good. now can we get back to the Thin Red Line instead of "my favourite war movie...."

Well to be honest to say it is the best war film you are going to have to make comparisons to other war films. Its no point argueing a film is the best one if you dont take into account the brillance of some other films, e.g. the start of Saving Private Ryan is alot better than any of the battle scenes in Thin Red line.

Would be very blinkered view if you just said it was a great film and not take into account other films

ObeyGiant

Big Nelly wrote:

Well to be honest to say it is the best war film you are going to have to make comparisons to other war films. Its no point argueing a film is the best one if you dont take into account the brillance of some other films, e.g. the start of Saving Private Ryan is alot better than any of the battle scenes in Thin Red line.

I agree with everything you're saying here, but I'm left wondering why you aren't applying it both ways. For me, war movies aren't just about their pyrotechnic set-pieces, or their graphic depictions of battle. If they were, then I'd totally agree that Saving Private Ryan or Apoclypse Now are some of the best war movies ever made. Thankfully, that's not what war movies are all about.

Saving Private Ryan came out around the same time as the Thin Red Line and I remember coming out of Thin Red Line feeling like I'd learned a lot more about the nature of war and more about the human side of the conflct than I had from Saving Private Ryan.

Big Nelly

ObeyGiant wrote:

I agree with everything you're saying here, but I'm left wondering why you aren't applying it both ways. For me, war movies aren't just about their pyrotechnic set-pieces, or their graphic depictions of battle. If they were, then I'd totally agree that Saving Private Ryan or Apoclypse Now are some of the best war movies ever made. Thankfully, that's not what war movies are all about.

Saving Private Ryan came out around the same time as the Thin Red Line and I remember coming out of Thin Red Line feeling like I'd learned a lot more about the nature of war and more about the human side of the conflct than I had from Saving Private Ryan.

Exactly, I never said I disliked The Thin Red Line but as a spectacle I enjoyed Saving Private Ryan more, you need to be in the mood to watch The Thin Red Line because it can be heavy going but will SPR you can just stick it on and watch people getting blown up

The suggestions on good film above are not all pyrotechnic either is correct, have you watch A bridge too far?? great story and some great acting. It doesnt have to be all about the meaning of war or special affects to be a good film. If you get a load of good actors and a decent script you can have one hell of a good film without going into the whole affects of war etc

Lurk

ObeyGiant wrote:

Saving Private Ryan came out around the same time as the Thin Red Line

I remember seeing them at about the same time as well, but I had a different feeling. After watching SPR my overriding thought was 'god, I'm so lucky not to have lived then,' but I didn't have this feeling of empathy after TRL. Perhaps Caviezel's character was too up in the clouds for me to identify with; any of the guys in Hank's troop were just simple folk stuck in extraordinary circumstances. Guess what I'm trying to say is that i'm simple, but there ya go :rolleyes:

sonic juice

Apparently Martin Scorsese's favorite films of the 90s, as he told Roger Ebert's television show, he ranked it #2

Sad Professor

I've never really liked war movies, to be honest. I find the whole genre fairly boring and predictable. Even the best ones (Platoon) are riddled in cliché. Despite all the praise it received, Saving Private Ryan is fairly standard 50's war propaganda stuff, the direction and photography are excellent though.

I love The Thin Red Line but its very uneven, IMO. Incredible, beautiful, fascinating, absorbing in parts but it never seems to all tie together like a movie should. He definately had trouble editing.

Mallick's films are best thought of as tone poems but I'm not sure that they work at feature length.