Band of Brothers, Part 1

Ok, I know, this isn’t really a “film” per se, but since I make the rules here, I’ll decide what’s worth writing about. If you think it’s ironic that my first significant entry would prove my foreword to be partly untrue, well, so do I.

For those of you who don’t know, Band of Brothers is a miniseries about the exploits of the 101st Airborne Division during World War II. It follows actual events, which are tied to actual veterans of said division via snippets of interviews at the beginning of each episode. There is also a final episode that contains nothing but interviews, which I found riveting, after witnessing the rest of the series. All in all, it’s a series of good stories made better by the fact that they’re all true, or at least as true as the soldiers’ collective memories.

I originally heard about this series from a sort of general buzz floating around amongst my friends at school. A number of them were getting together regularly to watch the episodes, and my curiosity was piqued, though I remained wary. My past experiences with “miniseries events” had consisted largely of Stephen King adaptations that, for lack of a better word, sucked. Still, Band of Brothers originally aired on HBO, as opposed to network TV, and thus I was hopeful that the war scenarios would remain untainted by broadcast standards. By “untainted,” I mean that the realistic and often horrific violence of war would not be slashed down to a few cuts and bruised, with all the character deaths insinuated just off camera, and wonderfully-fake teardrops in everyone’s eyes. Still, I had no idea what kind of a budget this project was working with, though I was pleased to note that both Tom Hanks and Steven Spielberg were involved.

When I finally got around to watching the first few episodes, which I have recently revisited, I was immediately impressed by the characters. Though it can be hard to keep all the soldiers straight, especially when they’re all wearing helmets and are covered in mud, the series does a good job of creating believable characterizations for each of the men. I’m sure it helps that these were all real people, and that some of them are still alive. Still, the actors and the filmmakers have to be able to effectively convey the personalities of the men in a way that a) makes them people and not caricatures, and b) makes them likeable without making them perfect. Right from the start, we see people who are just trying to get by, we see some who are trying to prove something to the world, and we see some who are just plain heroes.

The first episode focuses largely on the training of the men, and it features David Schwimmer as Lt. Soble. Your initial reaction might be something like mine: “Great, that whiny jerk from that abominable sitcom is supposed to be a tough boot-camp trainer.” While I freely admit that he’s not the man I’d pick as a tough guy, and especially not in such a prominent role in the “first-impression” episode, Schwimmer does a commendable job. He’s initially a just a hard-ass, exampled by him making his men run up and down a serious hill far more often than anyone else in the camp, by disciplining every minor infraction with excessive measures, and even by giving the men a nice spaghetti dinner just so they can vomit it all up during a surprise run up the infamous hill. However, as time progresses he turns out to be actually somewhat insecure. He can’t read a map, which leaves his men in the wrong place at the wrong time, and his orders during training maneuvers get all of his men “killed” because he can’t take the pressure of waiting. For all his tough-guy posturing during the physical training days, he’s scared by his command, and his exaggerated desire to make sure he’s doing the right thing has repeatedly disastrous results. It’s apparent, when he gets promoted to a training/command position for non-coms, that he has a vision of himself as a strong leader, one that his men want to follow. When he’s essentially removed from active duty, he takes it well, but I couldn’t help but feel sorry for him; he worked long and hard to create a group of soldiers who were united and rock-solid, but who also hated him and didn’t trust his leadership.

There’s something horrible about watching a man do his best but still end up failing miserably. Maybe it’s just that I can rather closely identify with that feeling of powerlessness in such a situation, but I feel for the guy. He seems to have this idea of himself as a great warrior, leading his men into the fray and paying for it with the sweat and blood of his own body and those of the men around him. Instead he gets to teach doctors how not to break their legs when jumping out of airplanes, because he can’t read a map or make decisions quickly enough. The truth is, the duty he ends up performing is probably just as important as the one he would prefer, he just never gets to see the benefit of it firsthand. It’s tough being the only person around who can’t seem to get his act together.

That’s all for now. Band of Brothers is a goldmine, though, and I will certainly return to it as soon as I can. I’d like to address two other characters, namely Winters and Nixon, before I put my “spiritual” interpretation into it (I put that word in quotes here because I’m not sure there’s any other kind). I may also take a break from BoB at some point to throw in some other movie discussions. Who knows, maybe they’ll even be movies.

On the potential horizon are Sin City, Garden State, and Hero, in no particular order. There are also some classics that will undoubtedly make appearances.

Let me know what you think.