From the recently completed documentary Gunner Palace, about a troop of US soldiers based in one of Uday Hussein's Baghdad palaces, a musical interlude. The cinetrix becomes increasingly convinced that sometimes music is the only way to impose structure on events that surpass comprehension.
No word of a US release date, but perhaps a distributor will try to piggyback on the success of 9/11. Until then, here's an excerpt from filmmaker Michael Tucker's chronicle of making his film.
Jackass Goes to War
This had become their movie, not mine—each person with their own reference. For the older officers and NCOs it was MASH. They brought aloha shirts for poolside BBQs. For others it was Platoon and Full Metal Jacket. You could see it in the way they rode in their HUMVEES. One foot hanging out the door—helicopters with wheels. For the teenagers, it was Jackass Goes to War. As much as they projected cultural icons into their lives, through my viewfinder you could see that they were defining their own experience; a movie different than anything anyone has seen before. One day, while recording freestyles, a young SPC looked at the camera, charged his weapon and said," For y'all this is just a show, but we live in this movie."
Notice there's no mention of Three Kings, which I've argued elsewhere was the first hip-hop combat movie, driven as it was by a quest for bling. [Please see comments for more.] Still, it's chilling that the only way these soldiers can process what's happening to them is through the movies. Because at the end of the day, "it's only a movie" doesn't keep you safe.
You can read more about Gunner Palace in an interview with Michael Tucker conducted by GreenCine's own David Hudson and in the Guardian.
A lot of soldiers told me that they resented people at home, a lot of the cheerleading going on. War has become a kind of entertainment. One soldier says, at the end of the film, when you get off your couch with your microwave popcorn, you're going to forget about this, but we'll never forget.
