denis888
There are many war films, and yeah, there are both good ones and poor ones. This one, made in 1959 by Martin Landau and starring Gregory Peck is somewhere in the midst still leaning more to a weaker side. Why? It seems a cool winning formula - to depict a heroic Hill assault, long charge and then a long defense of the Hill. Yeah, but in reality the film is just one long, terribly slow battle scene that is getting tedious already after 30 minutes. Another obvious detail is that actors seemingly perform with a certain effort as if they were forced or simply do not enjoy their lines. It all seems to be one languid, idle and slow pacing attack that is a big bore and a huge yawn. The Longest Day, being made several years after this one, at least has a huge asset - psychological development of many heroes. Here we see caricature schematic Koreans, endless fight and idle remarks. Nice but passable
LeonLouisRicci
The Realistic Battlefield Photography, especially the static Shots of the Aftermath of conflict are Outstanding. The Solid Cast of up and coming Character Actors and a Contemplative, Meditative Mood, all combine for a glimpse at the Futility of Fighting in a Forgotten War.The Propaganda inserted for the Cold-War effort ("they are not orientals, they are communists"), and the Pat rescue Ending are Forced into the Movie and really do nothing to Enhance the Realism of the rest. There are a few other Distractions of Disbelief. The Loudspeaker Brainwashing and the Heavy Handed Peace Talks scenarios are typical Hollywood hokum.But Overall, the Film Succeeds mostly because of the Better Parts, and the Movie is a Worthwhile Effort. It almost gives a Glimpse of what was to come in the 1960's and that was Not a Pretty Picture. No amount of Mind-Control would make us Forget the next "Police Action" (undeclared War).
breakdownthatfilm-blogspot-com
Since the Korean War, nothing has been said about it. Yes it is mentioned in history books but even then, the subject matter is skimmed over. No one really knows what happened during that time except for the individuals who took part in the battle. Unfortunately, not many are left to tell their story. Thankfully director Lewis Milestone had the ambition to make this film in honor of those who fought during that time.Gregory Peck plays Lt. Joe Clemons, a tired soldier who is on the boarder of losing all his men because communication ties are running thin between him and headquarters. Along side Peck is Harry Guardino, George Peppard and Rip Torn. At first, it may seem a little difficult to see who's who, because the film is black and white but it doesn't take long before these recognizable faces come clear. What's nice though is how well each actor portrays their character. Each one has a specific background and when they talk about themselves, it reflects the time of the era very accurately. Another great feature is the set design. Every piece of the set is like what it would be if the viewer were in the soldier's shoes. There's nothing comforting about warfare and that is what's in this film. Barb wire, bunkers, sandbags, flood lights, bayonets and dirt is all that will be seen; which is anything but cozy. Also the fact that the psychological aspect being inserted into the story makes things even more accurate. Trying to persuade the Americans to leave over a loudspeaker can make them very uneasy, which is understandable.As for action, I suspect some viewers will be turned off that there's no blood and guts. But what could someone ask for from the era of conformity? Realistic gore was considered taboo at the time and probably would have freaked too many people out. Especially since the government didn't want the families at home to see what war was really like. For this element, the audience must suspend from their minds that gore just wasn't permissible at the time, and there for, omit it from affecting their judgment of the film.For the few films that focus on the Korean War, this film shows the best reflection of what times were like. The actors perform well, and the set is accurately grimy which is all due to Milestone's direction.
tieman64
This supposedly "anti-war film" is perhaps a textbook example as to how intellectually dishonest most war films are.On June 25th, 1950, North Korea invaded South Korea. It did this, it insisted, in reply to an invasion of their territory by South Korea. In response, the United Nations sided with the South, demanding the withdrawal of all North Korean troops. Of course North Korea ignored the UN, and promptly went on to capture Seoul, the capital of South Korea.Three days later, US ground troops entered the fray, determined to "halt the spread of the North Korean Communists". After a series of defeats, however, the US troops promptly fell back. As a result of these defeats, General Douglas MacArtur was appointed by the UN to lead the fight against the North Koreans, leaving no doubt that the UN was primarily functioning as an extension of US foreign policy. Meanwhile, North Korea continued in its victories and by early August, both the Soviet Union and China were pronouncing that the North-South conflict was a civil war and that all foreign troops should withdraw. Days later, the US, through a UN representative, stated that this war was really a "police action" and that their aims were to "unify Korea", implicitly at the expense of the communist North. In other words, the North/South Korean border had become the location for a proxy war between the US and the Soviet Union, the West squaring off against the "ideology of communism".China, of course, didn't want to be left out of the action, and so sided with the North Koreans, stating that they would not tolerate "their neighbours being savagely invaded!" By the end of the year, Chinese troops had crossed the borders and joined North Koreans in a major offensive against the UN and US. The war went back and forth for many weeks, neither side gaining an advantage, until cease-fire talks began and peace arrangements were made. These peace arrangements promptly broke down, however, as both sides "interpreted the peace deals" as they saw fit. Thus, in June 1952, UN forces began bombing targets in North Korea, which in turn resulted in heightened North Korean violence, which in turn finally resulted in shaky cease fire agreements, the war finally ending weeks later. The result: Korea wasn't unified, communism didn't "spread" and the US and UN began erecting large forts and military emplacements along the North/South border. Over three million civilians were killed in the conflict.Released one year after Kubrick's "Paths of Glory", Lewis Milestone's "Pork Chop Hill" essentially tells the same story, the film focusing on group of soldiers who die in vain for a strategically unimportant hill in the middle of Korea. Milestone (who famously directed the anti-war film, "All Quiet on the Western Front") points fingers at callous generals and politicians, condemning the faceless decision makers who wage war by proxy, but his script is heavy-handed and his dialogue at times too obvious.What's problematic about "Pork Chop Hill", though, is the way that it makes no mention of the Koreans, and instead reduces the Korean conflict to a battle between Americans and Chinese on a hill. The film then goes on to depict the Red Chinese as snarling savages, a communist horde which rarely rises above the way the Nazis are portrayed in WW2 propaganda movies. Given the time of the film's production and release (1958-9), this makes perfect sense. Partly because they sensed America's unbroadcasted failure in the war, Americans had swept the Korean experience under the rug, the Korean conflict promptly becoming the forgotten American war. It therefore would do nothing for the film's financial prospects to attempt to revive these memories. (US amnesia about Korea contributed to the next US war, where Americans felt they might erase their vague sense of defeat by succeeding in Indo-China where their predecessors, the French, had failed.) But though Korea was wiped from the public's consciousness, the Cold War between the US and the "Reds" (ie Soviet communists) persisted. Thus, it is really to this conflict that "Pork Chop Hill constantly refers, with the Chinese filling in for their communist brethren, the Soviets. (In reality, China and Russia were only ever very volatile allies) The film is therefore entirely contradictory, muddling together two diverse and inherently opposed agendas. On the one hand, the makers want to say something about how grunts are manipulated and sacrificed by distant generals and politicians. They wish to show war as horrifically out of the hands of those who fight and die in it. This aim, of course, predicts a pessimistic, even a tragic outcome and outlook. On the other hand, the makers also want something else entirely. They want to curry the favour of 1959 audiences by invoking the fears of the Cold War, a "war" to which these audiences can directly relate, a procedure that needs to predict an optimistic, even a celebratory outcome and outlook. Since the substitution of the Cold War for the Korean War was deemed by the makers incapable of being acknowledged, the film's contradictory aims result in an ambivalence towards the entire Korean conflict and its consequences. It wants to celebrate the soldiers of the Cold War, a war which it sees as necessary, whilst also mourning the loss of those who died in the Korean conflict (historically a part of the Cold War). Celebratory vs Tragedy: it is in this fashion that most war films (even those which proclaim themselves to be antiwar) veer pathologically between antiwar statement and gung-ho propaganda.7/10 – Like Milestone's earlier "Halls of Montezuma", the film uses a near-expressionistic tone for its battle scenes. It's in these wordless moments that the film works best.Worth one viewing.
