Gun crew from Regimental Headquarters Company, 23rd Infantry, firing 37mm gun during an advance against German/Wikimedia Commons
The filmmakers who gave the world Saving Private Ryan, and Jarhead are shipping out to recreate World War I in the upcoming drama 1917.
The film will be produced by Steven Spielberg (Jaws, Indiana Jones, Jurassic Park, Saving Private Ryan) and directed by Sam Mendes (Jarhead, Skyfall, Spectre, Road to Perdition) — and the two are going to work on it as soon as next month.
There’s no shortage of bad leadership in war movies. It’s not even that the leaders are always bad or incompetent, though some are — like Jeremy Renner’s character in “The Hurt Locker,” who seems to have a death wish that he wants to share with his entire team.
On June 7, more than 10 years after the theatrical debut of “Jarhead,” the critically acclaimed biographical war drama about a young Marine sniper (Jake Gyllenhaal) deployed to Iraq during Desert Storm, “Jarhead 3” was released on Blu-Ray DVD, prompting a number of fans to scratch their heads and say, “Hey, wait, there’s a Jarhead 2?”
In “Jarhead,” Sam Mendes’ 2005 film about the Operations Desert Shield and Desert Storm, “war is boring as hell” is perhaps more apt than the oft-touted saying, “war is hell.” One of the few war flicks that focuses more on the wait for action than combat itself, the film is based on the memoir by Anthony Swofford a Gulf War veteran and former Marine scout sniper.
All military veterans and active duty personnel know at least one story about a deployed service member whose loved one betrayed him or her in some brutal, heartbreaking fashion. (Think of that scene in “Jarhead” when the Marine receives a video of his wife getting screwed by the next-door neighbor.) We asked some of the Task & Purpose contributors to share their own stories from the field. In hindsight, some of these stories are hilarious, but man, what is wrong with people?
