The Thin Red Line

The Thin Red Line (1997)

Recently, I watched Terrence Malick's The Thin Red Line for only the second time since its release almost 15 years ago.  Again, I was surprised by how badly I misremembered a film.  At the time of its release, it seemed impossible to consider The Thin Red Line separately from Steven Spielberg's Saving Private Ryan, which was released a few months earlier and which seemed to me when I first saw it to be a far superior film.  Spielberg's war epic had everything Malick's movie seemed to be missing: a strong central character, a driving narrative, a sense of heroism rising from a visceral depiction of the chaos and horror of war.  By contrast, Malick's movie was overlong, spacey, and disjointed, meditating when it ought to teach and hesitating when it ought to use its special context to propel its plot forward.  Even after a few years' perspective (and exposure to Malick's other films) broadened my view of what genre-based films 'ought' to do, I still thought of The Thin Red Line as a misfire of sorts, lacking in focus and confused in plot.  It was an indulgent film, and it was obviously marred by a general sense of rustiness on Malick's part after more than two decades away from moviemaking.  However, after finishing my rewatching of The Thin Red Line last week, I realized my initial response was not only ungenerous, it was immature in a way that reflected my own biases as a moviegoer and, perhaps, as a person.

One of the scenes I remembered most clearly from my first viewing was the opening sequence of the film.  In this sequence, Witt (Jim Caviezel), who has gone AWOL in the South Pacific, swims in a blue crystal lagoon surrounded by hyper-romanticized native islanders.  As he swims, he meditates on his circumstances via voice over narration, pondering how and why the world of the West has fallen so far from its edenic beginnings.  The connection is clear: these people have it right--no war, no fighting, but most importantly, no distrust of one another.  For Witt, this is the West's great sin: we don't have any faith in one another, and as a result, we elevate ourselves and our own desires over the desires--and the rights to being--of others.  Witt's raison-d'etre for the rest of the film becomes living out the trust he longs to see in the world.  After being brought back to his unit, he accepts a disciplinary reassignment to a stretcher bearer unit, where he works with compassion and drive until he is called back up to his squad.  Once with his squad, he is an avid volunteer: he scouts, he leads, and in the end, he willingly sacrifices himself for his peers.  On my first viewing, the message seemed clear, and it seemed to be understood and enacted by the Christ-like Witt, whose sacrifice (we hope) opens the eyes of his comrades-in-arms.  Although interesting, one supposes, this argument seemed flimsy to me in 1997 and it continues to seem flimsy now.  Does the movie really expect us to believe that all we need, really, is a little more love?

But there was another scene I had forgotten since that first viewing, and for me, it changes everything.  Approximately two-thirds of the way through the film, Witt has another encounter with natives--this time, the natives of Guadalcanal.  Wandering the countryside during a five-day stint away from the front, Witt makes his way into a native village.  Once there, he clearly prepares himself for another return to paradise, removing his shirt and gun, smiling, waving, and making a quick offer of food to the first village child he sees.  However, this visit is met with hostility on the part of the natives: they glare at him, fearing his ability to act with violence free from accountability, but distrustful of his skin and face.  Witt is startled by this, and if The Thin Red Line had been directed by an inferior director, this moment may have been a sufficient rebuttal (or, at least, a challenge) to Witt's earlier fantasy.  But Malick directs the scene with tremendous care, and his decisions here shape and interpret many of the questions from the rest of the film.  Here's my memory of the shot sequence following Witt's rejection in the eyes of the natives:

Witt looks at a female villager, who refuses to meet him in the eyes.  Witt sees an older male, who glares at him while nonetheless backing away and lifting his hand up to protect children standing near him.  Witt sees a child, also refusing to see his face.  He looks past one child at another, this one starving and with dozens of bite marks from flies and other insects scarring its back.  Voices arguing quietly can be heard off camera.  Witt sees another fearful and hateful male villager, this one in his mid-20s--around Witt's age.  Voices continue.  He sees the dilapidated conditions of the huts.  Voices continue.  He sees the water, just through the trees; we see his eyes, remembering his first experience AWOL.  He finally sees the sources of the voices: two older village men, arguing with one another.  We realize that, were it not for his presence, they would be fighting physically and openly.

For me, this scene offers the skepticism I thought the film lacked 14 years ago, and it does so in a way that is both sincere and tragic: Witt's utopia is impossible in all places but the minds of men.  The "thin red line," it turns out, is not the line separating us from civility and barbarity, it is the line we are walking: narrow, bloody, and one from which it is impossible to deviate.  The sadness of the film--and the unity of the film--come from Witt's slow realization that his decision to look around himself and see his world does nothing to help him access it.  It's this underpinning which supports the natural beauty of Malick's movie, which I will refrain from going on and on and on about.  It also justifies (and makes useful) the visions we so frequently get of the natural world's role, proximity, and relation to the soldiers involved in this conflict: these aren't men hiding behind concrete barricades--these are boys crouched in tall grass, encroaching on a world that cares not a bit whether they are there or not.

One closing thought which, thankfully, remained consistent from 1997 until now: The Thin Red Line, like all of Malick's movies, is truly beautiful.  If you haven't seen it, it is streaming on Netflix in HD, and you honestly owe it to yourself to give it a look.  Even if Malick's vision isn't for you, there is an undeniable craftsmanship at work here that you ought to experience.  This is the kind of movie that confronts you--aggressively--with the magnitude of what movies are capable of.  Don't miss it.