Jarhead

Matt and I watched “Jarhead” late last night. We finished up at about 12:45, so it was all too fresh in my head all night and this morning.

Upon further reflection, I think the movie was actually done pretty well. The perspective was of one on the ground, who doesn’t know much more than what he can see. From what I’ve heard, it reflected pretty accurately how things went down over there during Desert Storm for your standard troop, who was sitting around, waiting for action and going not-so-slowly insane. More American casualties from accidentally dropping a grenade that someone was juggling out of boredom than from actual combat, as I recall. Those were the days.

However… I try to avoid war movies. They appeal to, and speak for, a segment of the population of which I, frankly, am afraid – the out-of-control male. In a sense, I suppose, they’re VERY controlled at times of combat in the military, but then again, they’re bred to fight and kill and conquer, and those elements of manhood frighten me very much indeed. The raw, guttural, grunting male who would prefer to drag a woman home by her hair and … well, yuk, than to make pleasant conversation. You get my drift. (?) Scenes of, ahem, males gratifying themselves (* see note below) are among the hardest for me to watch. I simply Do Not Get It. And again, *coughcough,* I think I’ll leave it at that. Not sure if that says more about me being a woman, or being simply me.

So, I was left with some fairly unpleasant impressions from the movie, though, as I say, it was done fairly well. And it wasn’t that gratuitous, really. Not that much HAPPENED – that was sort of the point. That, and, what any engagement** does to a person. Does to (in this case) his life. … these guys were trained to kill throughout – to live and die for that one great shot (these were, specifically, snipers, these two) – and toward the end, two of the guys have it. That shot, in their sights. The order to shoot to kill confirmed. One doesn’t seem to be quite up to it, and the other goes absolutely ape when a commander shows up and orders them to stand down because they’re about to do an airstrike, after all. The guy who flips out just wants his one chance to kill someone. Don’t take away his chance! He just wants that One Kill. I guess that would justify, or make some sense of, all the crap he’s gone through over the past year. Or maybe he really has totally lost it.

I feel a bit odd expressing all this because, as my boss reiterated when we were discussing the movie this morning, “these are our readers!” Or rather, these are the coveted 18- to 27-year-olds whom we would love to have as readers. But they’re too busy playing video games, reading the Internet, or, uh… whatever it is they do all day.

All in all: Thank God I’m a woman. Seriously. Thank God. I just don’t want to deal with some of the stuff that men deal with.
And also, in fairness, thank God for the sorts of men who are nice people to be around. Who don’t wear their emotions, or urges, on their sleeves.

The movie did take care of one nagging thing for me – I now have another impression of Jake Gyllenhaal aside from gay cowboy (shepherd, actually). HOO-ah.

* I am not pro this behavior; I am not anti this behavior. I simply do not ever want to see it, hear it discussed, or know anything about it.
** at first, I typed simply "what any engagement does to a person. Does to one's life." Har! But, really, I meant military engagement...