Patton

Patton (Franklin J. Schaffner, 1970) Patton was a different kind of war movie. Where most films of that genre would concentrate on the cinematic battles, or use the war as a back-drop for soap-stories, Patton chose to take the more quixotic route of Lawrence of Arabia (or more appropriately, The Desert Fox about Patton's "player on the other side" in Africa, Erwin Rommel) by making a personal story about war and how it shapes the human being. Of how the warrior makes the war, but war also makes the warrior. The world war is the most important story, of course. But the story of General George S. Patton, Jr. (played by George C. Scott, with all the eerie command he brought to every role, probably far more than the real Patton personified) is so intertwined with that war's European campaign, as a mover and shaker of it, and his fortunes so changed by it (and not for the good) that even as it revels in the eccentricities of the man, it also shows how out of touch a professional warrior and student of conflict can be in this day and age.

Or in any day and age.
"God, how I hate the twentieth century" is one of the laugh-lines of Patton. But it's one of the truest lines of the script (by Fox scribe Edmund H. North and a very young Francis Ford Coppola). Patton, the soldier, was from another time (he thought so, literally), and his romantic notions of war and warriors made him an "odd duck" of the military, and a "lame duck" when it came to the political strategies inside an Army at war. He held disdain for bureaucratic warriors on both sides of the conflict (including "that paper-hanging son-of-a-bitch" in Berlin and his British counterpart Field Marshall Bernard Law Montgomery—played with birdlike pompousness by Michael Bates), the exceptions being his West Point classmate Dwight Eisenhower, and Erwin Rommel, who had opposing tank battle scenarios to Patton's own. The movie has the Germans studying Patton and his techniques, more approving of Patton than his own fellow Allied Commanders.
Scott's position as the centerpiece of the film is critical, but director Franklin J. Schaffner,* who apprenticed in live television and whose previous film was the better-than-it-deserved-to-be Planet of the Apes, brought his customary expansiveness to the theater of war. With a wide-screen process dubbed "Dimension 150,"** Schaffner created vistas of carnage and blazing battles of ferocity that took a dirtier, grimier and bloodier view of battlefield action than had been seen previously in the "clean-kill" war movies preceding it.
Patton, the man (both in life and on film) romanticized war, reveled in it, but the film bearing his name went further than most in de-glamourizing the traditional heroics of the less thoughtful war films, carefully explaining the strategies, viewing the battles dispassionately, almost like a chess-master reviewing the board, and in the after-math, taking stock of the scattered, shattered pieces. However planned a battle may be, it ends in chaos. Chaos and death. And in Patton, you can almost smell the stench of a battle-field's carnage.
Death is omnipresent in Patton, with detailed shots of dead and wounded in the battlefields, and of the crude graveyards made in haste. Some of the eeriest parts of Patton take place in those moments, backed by the cascading trumpets and marching jig of Jerry Goldsmith's spare score when it is stilled to shimmering strings, and unresolved motifs.****
Schaffner used his locations well, taking a page from David Lean, cramming as much information into the frames as he could, or by presenting stark landscapes that seemed to go on forever, showing the regimentation of war, how vast numbers of human beings could crowd a frame, or how solitary individuals could be lost in a landscape, or for that matter, History. The scenarists and Schaffner choose to end the movie, leaving Patton alive, just days before having his neck broken in a jeep accident. They leave him contemplating the transience of Glory walking mythically (and quixotically) towards a solitary wind-mill.
It is also about showmanship. A lot of actors turned down the role (some, like Rod Steiger, to their regret), but it was a tour de force for George C. Scott, who buried himself in the role, studying biographies, running films of the general over and over, doing an extensive make-up transformation—shaving his head to sport a Patton buzz-cut, matching the moles on Patton's face, and even having his teeth capped to make his smile more like the general's. There were some things he wouldn't do, like try to match Patton's voice—Scott felt simulating Patton's high-pitched voice*** would undercut some of his authority in the role.

The effect was extraordinary. Patton's kids, who were never too keen on the idea of the film, were amazed at Scott's appearance, and the role (which won Scott a Best Performance Oscar—which he famously refused) replaced the real-life General in the imaginations of the Nation, despite ample archival evidence.
Partially, it is the opening. Written by Francis Ford Coppola in an early draft of the script, it is a combination of several of Patton's inspirational addresses to his troops, performed—as if a stage performance—by a solo Scott before an out-sized American flag. It is this section of the script that most intrigued Scott, the stage actor, but also intimidated him. It was the last section filmed, and director Schaffner promised that it would be placed after the Intermission, as the actor—rightly—felt that the address would overpower the rest of the performance.

Schaffner, having a showman's instinct, reneged. And that speech, setting the tone and tenor of the performance that dominated the film, went immediately into pop iconography. It has been parodied and propagated for decades, a radical introduction to one of the more colorful players in the second World War. A thesis, a preamble, if you will, a first movement...but, more appropriately, a shot across the audience's bow.

***

The image most people have of Patton is George C. Scott.'s portrayal, 
but the real Patton was not so theatrical or full-throated.

* Few men were as suited as Schaffner to film this story: during WWII, he was part of the contingent landing at Sicily...under the command of Patton.

** It was camera-maker Todd AO's challenge to Cinerama, and presented a viewing range, or scope, of 150. Only two movies were shot in "Dimension 150"—The Bible and Patton. George C. Scott appeared in both of them.

****

"For over a thousand years, Roman conquerors returning from the wars enjoyed the honor of a Triumph—a tumultuous parade. In the procession came trumpeters and musicians and strange animals from the conquered territories, together with carts laden with treasure and captured armaments. The conqueror rode in a triumphal chariot, the dazed prisoners walking in chains before him. Some times, his children, robed in white, stood with him in the chariot...or rode the trace horses. A slave stood behind the conqueror, holding a golden crown, and whispering in his ear a warning—that all glory...is fleeting."

Patton Don't Make a Scene's:

The Opening

The Battlefield

The War-prayer

The Steel Helmet

The Steel Helmet (Samuel Fuller, 1951) Shot in ten days for a budget of $100,000, The Steel Helmet was the first film dealing with the, by-then, six month old Korean War. It was Fuller's third job as a director and his first established hit, but it marks a big contrast with the World War II films that were still making their way into theaters at that point.

The credits appear over a single steel helmet in the dirt. Once Fuller's director's credit fades away, the helmet begins to move. Underneath it is Sergent Zack (Gene Evans), tied and crawling out of his place in a pit where his entire captured squad was executed, he being the one survivor. He is untied and aided by a Korean orphan (William Chun), whom Zack dubs "Short Round" and while a bit of an annoyance, the kid is kept around while the soldier looks for other Americans.

Already Fuller is differentiating this film and this war from the squadron of films that came out of WW II. By the time of the film's release, movies made about the second world war were comfortably moving into the realm of myth, sanitizing the conflict and its hardships in the name of a "good war." But Zack is a different breed. He's scraggly, bearded, and a bit of a jerk, but a survivor. Suspicious of everyone and everything, he'll at least cut some slack if you're wearing the same uniform. But you have to prove yourself.

The rag-tag soldiers of The Steel Helmet

After fending off an attack from soldiers disguised as villagers praying at a small shrine, he and Short Round run into Cpl. Thompson (James Edwards), a medic, also the last survivor of his platoon. Thompson stitches Zack up and soon, they come across another group of dog-faces, lost in transit to a mission: to find a particularly strategically located Buddhist temple and establish a post. Along the way, the make-shift patrol is attacked by snipers hiding in the trees and attempt to disarm a booby-trap...unsuccessfully.

By this time, personalities have come to the fore. Every soldier is a "type," but not the usual religious and ethnic melting pot from the second World War films. Among the group is a yokel, a soldier who doesn't say much, a conscientious objector, a "green" college-educated officer, a Nisei soldier (who'd been to the West Coast concentration camps during the second world war and portrayed by veteran actor Richard Loo), and Thompson, who's black. This is stronger stuff than the Jews, Poles and Italians who provide "color" to white-washed war films of the previous decade. These guys are scruffy, too, and though typed, there's enough personality and grit to make them stand out as individuals, not tokens.

The crew makes their way to the temple, little suspecting there's a Korean sniper already entrenched there, outnumbered and biding his time, hiding in the shadows. As the soldiers set up a bivouac, the Korean takes out another of the rank and gets wounded in the process. The squad starts to squabble about what to do with their prisoner, while the whole time the huge Buddha observes mute in the background.  Eventually, Thompson treats the wounded captive, but once he's healthy again, the English-speaking prisoner starts to try to subvert Thompson and Tanaka by questioning why they would fight for America, given the racial prejudice visited on both their races.

That scene got Fuller in trouble with the FBI and the Army (who provided the film with stock footage) both for its portrayal of American troops and for bringing up American social deficiencies that might provide aid and comfort to the enemy (The Daily Worker also criticized the film for being too "right-wing"—leaving Fuller caught in the middle between idealized ideologies, something that would happen throughout his career).  

Thompson patches up "The Red."  Notice who's holding up the IV.

Warring ideologies inform the film, as well, especially over the POW. The GI's must battle between practicalities and the "better angels" of their natures over his fate. But, the point may be moot as a squad of North Koreans is advancing on the temple. Before the fight is over, more men will die and Zack will come to a greater understanding of his place in the war and rather than being hardened by his experience, learns to yield.

On an extremely small budget and a limited scope, The Steel Helmet still manages to pack more ideas and challenging points of view than most other war films, probably because there's less emphasis on battle and more on camaraderie, there's more getting along and survival skills than actual combat, which sets it apart. In typical Fuller fashion, the film is blunt, tough, practical and makes the most of its budget, while nudging insistently out of audience's comfort zones. Despite that (or maybe because of it) the film became a minor hit and launched Fuller into a Hollywood career directing and becoming a maverick doing it.