Part 4 of 8
Much of Steven Spielberg’s early work could be described as celebrations of childhood. There was a brilliant simplicity to them, and they often emphasized entertainment and wonder over gut-wrenching drama. This is not a criticism; some of his greatest films come from this early era. However, there came a point in the late ’80s when Spielberg began to develop slightly more complex sensibilities. This transition is best illustrated in 1987’s Empire of the Sun, a film which tells the story of a literal loss of innocence. It would also be the first of three Spielberg films about World War II. (Yes, 1941 is technically a World War II movie. I’m saving that for later.) Fittingly, these projects would prove to be some of the bleakest films he’s ever made, as they explore the consequences of war rather than the thrill of victory. Empire of the Sun, Schindler’s List and Saving Private Ryan would prove to be the films that escorted Spielberg to subject matter of a more mature sort.
When the new Spielberg made his debut in 1987 with Empire of the Sun, some were less than satisfied. At first, the subject matter may seem right up his alley. We meet the young Jamie Graham (a preteen Christian Bale, who is fantastic), who lives with his wealthy British family in Shanghai while Japan is at war with China. When his family attempts to evacuate, Jamie becomes separated from them in the massive, chaotic crowd. Now fending for himself, Jamie becomes a prisoner of war along with Americans played by John Malkovich, Joe Pantoliano and Ben Stiller, as well as a British doctor played by Nigel Havers. At the beginning of the film, Jamie is a regular, naïve child just like any other. When violence begins to break out around him, he doesn’t entirely understand the consequences. It’s all just another fun game to him. However, the film slowly watches Jamie as he is exposed to the horrors of a world at war. He literally goes from having everything—thanks to his parents—to having almost nothing at all.
Empire of the Sun is one of the most visually compelling films Spielberg ever made, and that is saying something. He has always understood the power of telling a story through the use of compelling images, but this is the rare case where the visuals completely overtake the story. Past Spielberg films have always had a single plot, as well as a perpetual forward momentum. With Empire of the Sun, he decided to slow everything down and make a film almost entirely devoid of plot. Jamie is not a character on a mission; the audience simply follows him through his various experiences. In many ways, this is the closest Spielberg ever got to making a Terrence Malick film, where individual moments of compelling imagery are meant to add up to something greater.
Unfortunately, Empire of the Sun doesn’t always have the impact it needs. While single moments are memorable—and each of Jamie’s adventures are compelling—the final film doesn’t quite add up to the sum of its parts. Yet the film’s greatest flaw is the score by John Williams, which is even more overbearing than usual. Empire of the Sun symbolizes a turning point in Spielberg’s career when he essentially left all wide-eyed innocence behind. Williams, however, still seems stuck in E.T.-land. If some scenes in Empire of the Sun played out to absolute silence, they might have held more impact. Instead, Williams is always around to tell you exactly how to feel at all times.
Still, Empire of the Sun marks a crucial point in Spielberg’s career. After this film, his oeuvre would focus more exclusively on films of a darker sensibility. This isn’t because he finds war and oppression all that fun, it’s just more interesting to explore subjects like the Holocaust than it is to make simple blockbuster fare. He had made his money, now he wanted to move forward as an artist. Even in his weaker efforts, Spielberg has always shown a willingness—nay, a desire—to try something he has never done before. That is why a brutal film like Munich ends up being a better film than Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull: he’s more interested in the subject matter of the former than the latter. He’s already made two films which became the most successful of all time, so he has more than earned the right to do whatever he wants.
It is interesting, however, that Spielberg was at first reluctant to tackle the Holocaust film Schindler’s List. He spent most of the ’80s trying to give the project to the likes of Roman Polanski, Sydney Pollack and Martin Scorsese, but ultimately he decided that this was a film he would have to make himself. He knew making it would be a burden in more ways than one, but eventually he decided to give it a whirl. While shooting was often a depressing experience for Spielberg, his cast and his crew, he came out the other end with a great film.
Schindler’s List was a departure for Spielberg not only in the realm of storytelling, but also when it came to the film’s production. Before this project, he would use just about every filmmaking trick in the book to give his film as much impact as possible. As a contrast, he shot Schindler’s List like an especially cheap documentary, and in black-and-white. This proved to be a masterstroke. In this format, the film is completely devoid of any beauty or excessive melodrama. It simply depicts the events as they occur, without any flourishes. What’s more, this method is what makes the film timeless. It looks as if it could have been made in any year between the ’40s and 2011, and thus there will never be a time when the film looks dated.
The power of Schindler’s List comes from its ability to simultaneously hold nothing back yet exercise almost absolute restraint. In its depiction of the horrors of the Holocaust, the brutal violence is shown in a very matter-of-fact way which likely evokes what it was really like in a concentration camp. At any given moment, a prisoner could very well be killed. Or, they may be spared. It was entirely arbitrary, and often dependent on the mood of the Nazi officer in front of you. They did not see the prisoners as people, but instead as objects which could be toyed around with. At first, Oskar Schindler (Liam Neeson) feels the same way, until he sees exactly what his fellow Nazis are doing to these Jews. So begins his plan to save as many people as he can.
This is the definitive Holocaust film. It is an important story, told in the best possible way. That Spielberg—a member of the Jewish faith himself—was able to remain so even-handed is astonishing. The only true flaw comes with the infamous “I could have done more” scene, but that is but a speed bump in a film that takes its audience so entirely into a world of despair that when freedom finally comes it feels like a breath of fresh air. In many ways, Schindler’s List is more than a movie. It is an important historical document that people will be experiencing for years to come. It is a reminder that the Holocaust truly did happen, and it begs that we not let it happen again. It is not beyond criticism, but its significance cannot be denied. In the story of Oskar Schindler, it finds light in the darkness.
While Empire of the Sun and Schindler’s List take place during World War II, neither are truly about the war itself. Instead, they are about the people that lived on the periphery of the battle, and how it affected who they were as people. Over the course of the war, Jamie Graham’s childhood was taken away from him while Oskar Schindler’s eyes were opened to the crimes of Nazi Germany. However, neither of them did any time on the battlefield. Spielberg finally told this story with 1998’s Saving Private Ryan, though the characters here aren’t necessarily on a mission to destroy Adolf Hitler. Instead they are given the thankless task of hunting down Private James Ryan, whose brothers have been killed in action. He is to be sent home so that the entire Ryan clan is not wiped out, but the soldiers looking for him—led by a Captain John Miller (Tom Hanks)—aren’t too happy about doing the military’s public relations work.
Saving Private Ryan is extraordinary in its consideration of every life lost in the war, and it provides one of the great looks at moral ambiguity in a combat situation. The most famous sequence in the film is undoubtedly the opening invasion of Normandy, in which an entire army of soldiers begin an attack which they know they may not survive. Any of us can imagine the horrors of war, yet Spielberg—like in Schindler’s List—shows it to us in a powerfully straightforward manner. As countless Allied soldiers are mowed down by machine guns from on high, there is very little heroism involved. No slow motion deaths set to patriotic music can be found here. It is merely carnage.
Yet what comes after the D-Day sequence is equally powerful. These are men who have been told to fight for their country, no matter what mission they are given. Despite all this, none of them can fight the feeling that their current quest to find Private Ryan is entirely insignificant to the big picture. These are not blindly patriotic robots out to do whatever they are told. Each soldier in Saving Private Ryan is a full-fledged character with a history, feelings and emotions. The audience may care about them while watching the movie, but each of them fears that when the war is over they will all be insignificant to their country. If they are killed on their quest for Ryan, are they dying so that America may remain a free nation? Or are they dying so that the office-dwellers back home can have a good story? What ultimate purpose do their actions serve?
Where Empire of the Sun followed the plunge of a child into a world at war, Schindler’s List and Saving Private Ryan holds our heads underwater until we see the horror of it all. In many ways, Saving Private Ryan is the bleakest of the three films. Where the first two had moments of hope—Schindler’s List is about hope, despite the harrowing Holocaust sequences—Saving Private Ryan is much less optimistic. None of these films are pro-war, but Ryan just shows what a black hole war really is. Spielberg seems to take the stance that it is never really worth it to send all our young men overseas just to die, and Saving Private Ryan is a film about how it will never really do anyone any good. It is a good thing we won World War II—a great thing, actually—but the cost is far too great to ignore. This is a movie that claims war should be a last resort. At best.
World War II is often Hollywood’s war of choice simply because it was so massive. There were battles both in Europe and the Pacific Ocean, and millions and millions died either on the battlefield or in Nazi concentration camps. It even saw the invention of the most powerful weapon in the world: the atomic bomb. Spielberg’s three World War II films explore entirely different aspects of the war, but they all arrive at the same conclusion: it is never truly worth the cost. These were the films that showed us just how great of a filmmaker Spielberg is even when he isn’t dealing with the topics of killer sharks or aliens. Empire of the Sun doesn’t only depict one child’s accelerated path to the grim world of adulthood, it also began Spielberg’s transition from creator of feel-good blockbusters to chronicler of all life’s horrors. Either way, Spielberg has shown he can pull it off marvelously.
Next week: Spielberg chronicles the struggles of the oppressed in The Color Purple, Amistad and Munich.
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