Thin Red Line - Thomas Fosdick

 

Thomas Fosdick

The Thin Red Line is an incredible World War II movie that deals with a theater that is overlooked in a way that also overlooked. The pacific theater has never gotten the same coverage that the European theater has, yet the men who went through it suffered some of the greatest tests out of any serviceman during this time. This movie came out at the same time as Saving Private Ryan and was completely overshadowed by it. While this may be due to the theater they dealt with respectively (as I mentioned earlier) it has just as much to do with how each movie tells the story. Saving Private Ryan is much more like a documentary than it is an existential look at life and death such as The Thin Red Line. 

Many people today think very analytically and explicitly and therefore it makes sense that Saving Private Ryan was much more popular, it is much more accessible in that way. The Thin Red Line takes a much more ethereal approach, exploring the horror of death and the meaning/peace one can find in life once they reconcile with it. The chaos of war is presented in a terrifying way and the emotions the actors are able to evoke speaks to the film's ability to resonate with the viewer.     

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