Hacksaw Ridge is also one of the most crowd-pleasing movie you'll see this year. It is designed with precision to tap into something inside of you that makes you feel good and inspired. If you come away from that movie thinking that it was cheaply sentimental, then I would like to give you a hug and ask "who hurt you?", since that is the only reason that you could come away from this cold-hearted.
There's some wiggle room in both of those assessments, but I'll stand by most of it.
This is Mel Gibson's return to directing after taking a decade off. He's been through some stuff in that time and has acted in some questionable films, but it's nice to see him back in Braveheart mode.
The film tells the story of Desmond Dos (Andrew Garfield), an army medic who becomes the first conscientious objector to be awarded the Medal of Honor. It tells his story in the expected fashion (chronologically and from the beginning). The audience sees where and how he grew up. He's got an alcoholic father (Hugo Weaving) and a fiance (Teresa Palmer) -- don't worry, of course we get to see their "meet-cute". We follow him to boot camp so he can fight in WWII. There's a tough but caring drill instructor (Vince Vaughn) and a scene where we learn everyone in the troop's nick-names (It's a war movie, after all). When it's revealed that Dos refuses to fire a gun for religious reasons, he then has to work twice as hard as everyone else in boot camp to make it through and win their respect. Eventually, he makes it to the battlefield: a ridge in the Pacific that U.S. forces keep losing to the Japanese in bloody conflicts.
That's when the movie shines. Mel Gibson has never shied away from showing some stark violence, and he puts that to good use in a story about an army medic. He does a great job depicting the confusion and messiness of battle. For large chunks of time Dos completely disappears since he's there for the cleanup, not the fighting. His work as a medic is equally exciting though, since he has the added tension of not being able to fight back if attacked. So much of that latter part of the movie works because, even if the story is exaggerated, it's still damn impressive that someone would do what Dos did and live to tell about it.
Andrew Garfield is pretty great throughout. The Forrest Gump comparison is fair, even though he's not mentally handicapped. Garfield has a goofy accent and is as earnest as any man alive. It's hard not to root for him by the end. Teresa Palmer is charming in a cookie-cutter role. Vince Vaughn has fun playing somewhat against-type. Hugo Weaving hams it up too much and still manages to put together an effective redemptive arc. The soldiers are all from that same factory of 1950s-looking white guys that all the WWII movies pull from. None of them stood out, but they all did fine work selling the "war is hell" of it all.
It's true that I don't ever need to see a WWII movie again, ever before I saw this. It's such a thoroughly explored topic that it produces diminished returns now. For some people, that's going to be enough to turn them off completely. This film falls victim to "checklist storytelling" (i.e. the story is checking off events rather than telling a natural story), which could also annoy people. Its heart is in the right place though and there's efficiency to the narrative. The emotional beats feel earned by both the time put into them and the performances by the actors. This is a much better use of Mel Gibson's talents than Get the Gringo.
Verdict (?): Weakly Recommend
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