I had a massage yesterday. The therapist suggested I need to cry. So I watched Hacksaw Ridge. I cried. Multiple times.
Every now and then I come across a movie based on a true story that is genuninely hard to believe. All throughout Hacksaw Ridge I kept coming back to the thought that “this is a true story!” If you watch this masterpiece of a cinematographic feat, you will see what I mean. This film gets a 5 Heart Rating not just for the film itself but for the story behind the film. Desmond T. Doss, the main character in the film, was an exceptional human being. There’s a line in the film that I am not going to try to quote but it was about the fact that the soldiers didn’t believe what Doss believed but they believed in him believing. That was a very profound observation and described the atmosphere perfectly.
As a self-described passifist myself, I’ve grappled with the whole concept of war my entire life. My parents housed draft-dodgers during the Vietnam war. At the time we were staunch Catholics and the church was against the war. Over the years, my own ideas about war developed and my logical Libra brain still cannot understand why more people don’t realize how dumb war is. Whenever I go into a deep dive about war inside my own head, I try to see it from different perspectives but always come to the conclusion that it is all ego and power driven and nothing about it has evolved. It brings out the very worst in human behavior and shows just what we are actually capable of, no matter what side you’re on.
If a war was filled with all passifists like Doss, war would be called something else and would cease to exist as we have known it since the beginning of time. So for me, it was heartening to see how this superhero dedicated himself to being the ultimate helper under unimaginable circumstances. I for one, will continue to appreciate and show gratitude for the freedom that soldiers have fought and died for, but I still cannot understand why we have not evolved from thousands of years of repeating the same barbaric practices of war. To me, Desmond T. Doss was logical. And, as it turned out, he was also stronger than anyone imagined and showed just how much more powerful saving lives is than taking lives.
I hope you get to see this film but I will warn you, it is VERY graphic. I simply fastforwarded when it got to be too much. The heroicism shown in the movie is incredible but it’s the dialogue and pretty much everything Doss says throughout the film is quotable. You may be as surprised as I was by the cast and specifically Andrew Garfield’s performance as Doss.
It’s currently on Netflix. Here’s the trailer:
Also published on Medium.
