Cast: Nicolas Cage, Adam Beach, Christian Slater, Peter Stormare, Noah Emmerich, Mark Ruffalo, Brian Van Holt, Martin Henderson, Roger Willie, Frances O'Connor
Director: John Woo
Producers: Terence Chang, Tracie Graham, Alison R. Rosenzweig, John Woo
Screenplay: John Rice & Joe Batteer
Cinematography: Jeffrey L. Kimball
Music: James Horner
U.S. Distributor: MGM
Since arriving in the United States from Hong Kong, director John Woo has primarily helmed popcorn action movies like Face/Off and Mission: Impossible 2. Windtalkers represents his first English-language foray into "weighty" filmmaking. While the war movie genre allows him to maintain a high level of firepower and violence, Windtalkers has a serious underlying message about the folly of racism. Unfortunately, Woo's approach to this subject matter is anything but subtle or thoughtful. The result is that the film comes across as preachy and clichéd. And, while the battle sequences are well executed from a technical point-of-view, they often seem repetitive and uninspired.
Windtalkers chronicles the June 1944 Allied invasion of the Japanese island of Saipan. During this offensive, the Americans were using the so-called "Navajo Code" - a code developed from words in the Navajo language and translated by Navajos. Marine Sergeant Joe Enders (Nicolas Cage), a decorated fighting man, is partnered with Private Ben Yahzee (Adam Beach), one of the Najavo "codetalkers". His orders are simple: "Protect the Code". That means protecting Yahzee, unless he falls into enemy hands - then it means killing him. In a similar position are Sergeant Ox Anderson (Christian Slater) and his partner, Private Charles Whitehorse (Roger Willie). Meanwhile, Enders remains closed off from his fellows, including Yahzee, as he tries to come to grips with events in his past that have created physical and psychological scars. Although he doesn't recognize it yet, he's looking for the panacea of all war movies: redemption.
Windtalkers does an adequate job of developing the two protagonists, Enders and Yahzee, and no job whatsoever developing the half-dozen or so supporting characters. These turn into cardboard figures identified by their most obvious traits: The Bigot (Noah Emmerich's Corporal Chick Rogers), the Guy In Command With The Funny Accent (Peter Stormare"s Sergeant Gunny Hjelmstad), The Guy With The Beard, etc. We don't care about any of these people, so their deaths, when they happen, don't mean much. In fact, in some cases, the characters are so anonymous that, when they die, we're not sure to whom the body belongs.
The racism aspect is handled in such an overt manner that it's almost insulting. Great lengths are taken to develop Yahzee as the Marine equivalent of a saint (he never stops smiling, he's always polite, he is a great father and husband, and he hesitates to kill in cold blood). Yet some of the men around him won't accept him because he's not white. I'm willing to give the movie points for acknowledging the existence of racism directed against Native Americans who fought during the Second World War, but not for the manner in which this issue is handled. (For examples of stories that depict wartime racism without resorting to sledgehammer tactics, try Glory or the recent Hart's War.) Woo couldn't have been less subtle had he tried. (One consideration disturbs me - that audiences have become so oblivious that they may not be able to get the point unless it is hammered home in such a clumsy and inelegant manner.)
Woo's style reflects the post-Saving Private Ryan approach to war movies - lots of blood, guts, and gore. Spare the audience nothing. Yet, unlike pictures such as Ryan, Black Hawk Down, and We Were Soldiers, Windtalkers fails to bring us into the struggles of the fighting, and dying, men. This movie lacks the intensity and immediacy of the others. The battle scenes in Black Hawk Down were confusing because we were supposed to identify with the soldiers at the epicenter of the struggle, who didn't know what was going on. In Windtalkers, the battle scenes are confusing because we can't figure out who's who.
Windtalkers has a lot of trouble rising above the clichés that form its foundation, but there are times when it manages to do so. Thankfully, the Enders/Yahzee relationship doesn't turn into one of those mismatched buddy-type things. And there are times when Woo manages to capture an image of pure visual poetry. The most obvious occurs during the first scene. We see a butterfly hovering above a peaceful stream. Gradually, the water turns crimson, then a body drifts into view. Suddenly, the stillness is shattered by gunfire, and we realize that this pastoral scene is on the fringes of a battlefield. More moments of this power would have made Windtalkers a memorable movie-going experience.
Nicolas Cage, reunited with his Face/Off director, draws on his Leaving Las Vegas persona to create the dour, soul sick Enders. It's not a very deep portrayal, but it is effective in getting across the point that Enders is only a shell of the man he once was. Adam Beach is okay as Yahzee, although I found his frequent smiling to be irksome. No one else has a significant role, although Christian Slater gives a nice turn and Frances O'Connor is appealing in the movie's lone, largely unnecessary female part.
Windtalkers is one of the least distinguished entries into the new genre of war movies. This film proves that more is needed than visceral displays of battle carnage, digitally amplified gunfire and explosions, and a camera that won't keep still. Woo is unquestionably a director of great talent and ability, but he went into this movie with too weak a script, and the result is little better than a mediocre and repetitive depiction of one offensive in the most important war of the last century.
© 2002 James Berardinelli