Wednesday, November 4, 2009

Pearl Harbor

Months before 9/ll, the movie Pearl Harbor was released. I saw it at that time and was a little disappointed with it. I ran across of DVD of it recently and watched it again. I was still unimpressed.

The attack and the effects were breathtaking, yet fictitious characters, the love story took up most of the movie. I pulled the above image together because Pearl Harbor reminded me of the movie Titanic. In Pearl Harbor, they should have just as well have had hired on Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet for love interest part. Instead of the Titanic, they could have embraced each other on the bow of the Arizona.

Is it just me, or is Ben Affleck in every movie that was made?


I don't mind having fictitious characters in a movie - but there is enough of a real story to tell when it comes to Pearl Harbor. The love story, the idiocy of having the two old friends fighting over the same girl, just lacked imagination.

Directors I guess must have felt that they had to chic-a-fy the bombing of Pearl Harbor in order to get women into the theaters.


Hollywood usually does a great job at screwing up the depiction of a real event that had an abundance of real heroes. It wasn't Rafe and Danny that made their way to their planes to shoot down the attacking Japanese aircraft on December 7. In real life, it was two guys by the name of Kenneth Taylor and George Welch. Having two fictitious characters manning those planes is a disservice to those two very real gallant men.

At least that's the way I feel about it.


I feel the same way about the movie Titanic. This movie was a blockbuster hit, but I don't see it as memorable. The love story was okay, but it consumed most of the film. There was so much more to tell about the sinking of that ship. There were real people on that boat - and the fictitious characters overshadowed the real people, out-shined real heroes in that story. Both the movies Pearl Harbor and Titanic the same flaw. The special effects and details were incredible, but the real people who died in or survived those tragic events were only given supporting parts in these Hollywood productions. Both movies are worth watching once, but not worth revisiting.

4 comments:

Dionne said...

I couldn't agree more with your assessment/review. I can remember being unimpressed with how Titanic came together and what was "missing". I probably enjoyed Pearl Harbor a little more...mainly because I am fascinated with that time period.

I was able to visit the Arizona Memorial several years ago and listen to a survivor of the bombing. There are a wealth of stories out there that are disappearing daily. This is one "chick" that would be fine without the big romance in those movies. :)

Dionne

David Finlayson said...

I think it would have been a better movie if they had focused on the people that really lived.

The movie Saving Private Ryan was a story about D-Day and the days that followed. The characters are all fictitious. The first twenty minutes of the movie of the actual landing made an impact on me.

There wasn't a love story in it - thank goodness. Compare Saving Private Ryan to Band of Brothers and Brothers wins out hands down. Band of Brothers is so much better because it depicted what really happened to real people.

I'd one day like to visit Pearl Harbor.

Dionne said...

Pearl Harbor is amazing and made quite an impact on me. We were able to stay on Hickam AFB and see the buildings there.

I went to the BG Veterans Day parade on Saturday and met a survivor from Pearl Harbor that lives in BG. He was gracious and kind.

Unknown said...

Fin!
The events of Pearl Harbor changed America forever. In my mind it is as close a thing to an epic that we have in American Culture. It didn't occur over 40 years like Troy, but it was of those proportions... epic that is.
This movie didn't represent American culture during that time.It was some just some modern people dressed in old fashions. The music was wrong and the dances were wrong. People danced the two step, yo. And Glenn Miller was the Man. There was like one Glenn Miller song.Anyway... and they smoked like chimneys.
The other stuff.. Decaprio was mismatched for her she needed someone else..less hyperactive. He doesn't seem that way now, I guess he grew out of it.
Saving PR some good stuff in it.
But I can't see a veteran captain of North Africa and Frickin Anzio having his squad fall apart like that because of some nutt job clerical corporal. and if he had been an English teacher(which they injected so he could wax sappy about the condition human)he could have spoken French.
The machine gun nest and the little french girl scene. Endangered the whole mission.