The U.S. militaryâs Hollywood connection
On a sultry mid-July afternoon on this military base, a few hundred Marines, some with spouses and children in tow, were mustering for a free screening of the movie âWarriorâ at a squat cement cinema house on Mainside, the section of the 200-square-mile facility reserved for civilian comforts like the Stars and Strikes bowling alley and Smokeyâs House of BBQ.
In the film, which wonât arrive in theaters until September, a Marine just home from Iraq (played by Englishman Tom Hardy) and his estranged brother, a fighter-turned-teacher (Australian Joel Edgerton), train for a mixed martial arts tournament.
The militaryâs involvement ran deeper, though, than just throwing open the doors to the Bulldog Box Office at Camp Pendleton. The âWarriorâ script was vetted by a Marine Corps liaison to the entertainment industry, and more than 200 real Marines appear in uniform in a crowd scene.
Photos: Hollywood and the military
The Department of Defense regularly cooperates with Hollywood on projects large and small, from Lifetimeâs fictional Army base-set series âArmy Wivesâ and CBSâ naval police procedural âNCISâ to Paramount Picturesâ warring robots franchise âTransformersâ and Sonyâs Columbia Pictures film âBattle: Los Angeles,â about Marines fighting an alien invasion. The military has allowed Universal Pictures to film its upcoming action movie âBattleshipâ on the battleship Missouri and permitted Navy SEALs to appear in Relativity Mediaâs February thriller âAct of Valor.â
Over the decades, the relationship between Hollywood and the military has served the needs of both sides: Filmmakers gain access to equipment, locations, personnel and information that lend their productions authenticity, while the armed forces get some measure of control over how theyâre depicted.
Thatâs important not just for recruiting but also for guiding the behavior of current troops and appealing to the U.S. taxpayers who foot the bills. Given that less than 1% of the U.S. population is currently serving in the military, entertainment â including movies, TV shows and video games â is key to shaping the publicâs idea of what it means to be a soldier.
âHollywood feature films have served as the most significant medium to argue for the military,â said Lawrence H. Suid, author of âGuts & Glory: The Making of the American Military Image in Film.â âAmericans love violence, and war movies provide all that violence without the danger.â
But controversy over an upcoming movie about the killing of Osama bin Laden â and how much U.S. officials should assist director Kathryn Bigelow and writer Mark Boal â has shed light on some of the minefields that must be navigated by real-life warriors and the showbiz engine that seeks to portray them.
There are constant tensions over how troops are depicted â the military brass is often uncomfortable with the defiant, cocky heroes that filmmakers, and moviegoers, like to embrace. And rank-and-file troops have complaints from everyday details like the color of a soldierâs boots to broader questions about the true character of men and women in uniform. There are debates about how much access is too much and even whether certain films might serve partisan purposes.
On the surface, cooperating with filmmakers on a movie about the Bin Laden mission would appear to be a no-brainer for the Defense Department â after all, the operation was a spectacular victory for U.S. forces.
Bigelowâs movie â which was gestating long before Mayâs deadly raid in Pakistan by U.S. Navy SEALs and CIA operatives â is slated for release by Sony in October 2012 and will attempt to chart the decade-long pursuit of the terrorist leader. The filmmakers havenât locked a script or announced casting or location shooting plans.
Though many details remain to be determined, the story of an anonymous team of highly trained soldiers working successfully off the intelligence of multiple agencies and political administrations would seem to please the military and stand in stark contrast to many of the most iconic pop culture images of soldiering. From George C. Scottâs swaggering World War II general in 1970âs âPattonâ to the counterculture Korean War Army doctors in âMASHâ (both the 1970 film and the long-running TV series) to Robert Duvallâs unhinged air cavalry commander in 1979âs âApocalypse Now,â the most remembered military heroes in movies in the last 30 years are arrogant, independent mavericks.
âThere are these enduring stereotypes, Jungian archetypes, and they often show up in uniform in movies and TV shows,â said Phil Strub, director of entertainment media at the Defense Department. âOne of the things that comes up all the time is ⊠to be a hero, you have to defy the rules of your organization because theyâre not good. And you also have to do it as a loner. Going on your own and recklessly prevailing seems to be a very popular way of portraying people and of course totally antithetical to the military ethos. Just about everything we do, the whole notion of teamwork is kind of fundamental.â
Bigelow and Boal ran into such objections from the military on their last movie, âThe Hurt Locker.â The 2008 film, an adrenalized thriller about a renegade Army bomb defuser in Iraq, won the Academy Award for best picture, but the filmmakersâ early discussions with the Army broke down over differences about the script, Boal told The Times last year. According to Strub, the DOD never signed a production assistance agreement for âHurt Lockerâ or provided any physical support.
ââThe Hurt Lockerâ was problematic for us because it departed from what we thought was the real military ethos,â Strub said. âOf course we want to get the ribbon rack correct, of course we want people saluting looking properly. [But] the bottom line for us is how do people feel â how does a serviceman or servicewoman feel about the portrayal? ⊠That portrayal is more important by far than whether the eagle is facing forward.â
In the case of the Bin Laden movie, though, Bigelow and Boal have run into a different, more political set of concerns. Rep. Peter T. King (R-N.Y.), chairman of the House Committee on Homeland Security, sent a letter to the CIA and the Department of Defense asking for an investigation into whether the White House has granted filmmakers access to classified information for the project, intelligence that could prove useful to Americaâs enemies.
He also voiced concern about the timing of the movieâs release: Coming less than a month before the 2012 presidential election, he suggested, it could influence the race. In a press briefing, White House spokesman Jay Carney dismissed the claim that Bigelow and Boal had received access to confidential information as âridiculousâ and chided the committee, saying it should have âmore important topics to discuss than a movie.â
Strub said the Defense officials have yet to determine whether they will officially cooperate with Bigelow and Boalâs project. But Strub did acknowledge that Bigelow and Boal met with Undersecretary of Defense for Intelligence Michael Vickers this summer.
âThey have had one or two interviews with one of our senior intelligence officials...,â Strub said. âMr. Vickers was extremely discreet and very careful in his wording. He was speaking entirely of the kinds of things he had spoken about at various other unclassified interviews.â
Bigelow and Boal, who declined to be interviewed for this story, issued a statement through Sony that did not address whether they have been privy to confidential information. But they disavowed any political motivations.
âOur upcoming film project ⊠integrates the collective efforts of three administrations, including those of Presidents Clinton, Bush and Obama, as well as the cooperative strategies and implementation by the Department of Defense and the Central Intelligence Agency. Indeed, the dangerous work of finding the worldâs most wanted man was carried out by individuals in the military and intelligence communities who put their lives at risk for the greater good without regard for political affiliation. This was an American triumph, both heroic and nonpartisan, and there is no basis to suggest that our film will represent this enormous victory otherwise.â
Bigelow and Boalâs film isnât the only Hollywood project related to the Bin Laden operation thatâs run into resistance in Washington. Less than 48 hours after the White House had announced the news of Bin Ladenâs death, the Walt Disney Co. filed a patent application seeking the exclusive right to use the term âSEAL Team 6â â the elite special forces unit that led the raid â on movies, TV shows, video games and toys. When the Navy vocally objected, Disney quickly withdrew the request.
Each branch of the armed forces has its own intermediary to the film and television industries, all of them housed in an office building on Wilshire Boulevard in Westwood, while the DOD overseas the largest-scale collaborations from Washington. Some Hollywood heavyweights including âBlack Hawk Downâ producer Jerry Bruckheimer and âTransformersâ director Michael Bay have enjoyed long affiliations with the offices. Strub said the number of productions â including documentaries and even game shows â that receive some form of military assistance annually are too many to quantify and said that producers reimburse the government for out-of pocket expenses such as dedicated flight hours or servicepersonsâ time.
While often itâs Hollywood that comes knocking on the Pentagonâs door seeking help, sometimes the appeals flow the other way.
In June, Michelle Obama beseeched an audience of about 500 producers, writers, actors and directors in Los Angeles to tell more military familiesâ stories in entertainment, part of a larger White House initiative called âJoining Forcesâ tasked with improving housing, education, health and other programs geared toward those in uniform.
âYou have the vehicle to tell stories that just pull people in,â the first lady told the audience. âI ⊠urge you to do what you do best. Be creative. Be funny. Be powerful. Move us, [and] move America to think differently about these issues and about these families, and about our men and women who serve so graciously.â
In early 2012, she will appear on an episode of the Nickelodeon show âiCarlyâ to bring awareness to the effort, a bid to bring public attention to the largely anonymous struggles of military families.
Sometimes, a third party will play matchmaker between Hollywood and the military. For example, National CineMedia, which sells ads in movie theaters, paired the Army and 20th Century Fox for a marketing campaign designed to reach potential recruits. The campaign intercut footage from the Fox superhero movie âX-Men: First Classâ with images of real soldiers as a voice-over intoned, âHeroes â ordinary people who discover they can do extraordinary things.â
The spots played in cinemas, and exit polls of 17- to 24-year-olds leaving the movie theater found that those who saw the ad were 25% more likely to say they would consider joining the Army than those who didnât, according to U.S. Army Accessions Command Chief Marketing Officer Bruce Jasurda.
âWe get asked all the time, âWhy do you market?ââ said Jasurda. âWeâre a nation at war going on 11 years, which is ⊠the longest period of consistent conflict that the U.S. Armyâs ever been involved in, that the nationâs ever been involved in, longer than any war weâve been in, and all-volunteer force at that.
âThatâs why we market. We want to make sure people understand the full nature of this product. The Army is the ultimate considered purchase. Itâs a very dangerous way to make a living.â
Reaching the right kind of recruits, though, is important, Jasurda said â as is disabusing young people of some inaccurate notions about the military that Hollywood may have imparted.
âRambo types â people who are very brazen, bold, stick out their chest, braggadocios â theyâre not the people weâre looking for,â said Jasurda. âAll the physical and mental research weâve done shows that those Rambo types are gonna get weeded out pretty quickly and are probably the poorest recruits.â
Sgt. Cy Sibounma, a motor transport chief waiting in line for the Camp Pendleton âWarriorâ screening who has completed two tours of duty in Afghanistan, said Hollywood movies fail to accurately show the temperament of those in uniform.
âYou can get the haircut right, the boots, but you canât emulate a Marine,â Sibounma said. âItâs the intangible things that movies get wrong, the character, whatâs inside.â
After signing autographs and shaking hands with Marines, Hardy, âWarriorâsâ star, considered Sibounmaâs comment and described âfive minutesâ he served in the Parachute Regiment of the British Army.
âI left âcause I wasnât tough enough,â Hardy said.
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