At first blush, I thought that John Ford moment in Roland Emmerich’s Midway was surely over-the-top, a parody, like the semi-silly Bruce Lee bit in Quentin Tarantino’s Once Upon a Time in Hollywood. But why interrupt a deadly serious war film with what seemed to be a comic walk-on by a famous movie director, shouting orders and eager for action (or “Action!”)
So I trekked (again) to the Film Academy’s Margaret Herrick Library, to learn where Ford actually fit in the Midway battle.
Apologies to Emmerich. I stand corrected. His brief portrayal of Ford at Midway in June 1942 was, if anything, understated.
Film scholars will know, but I only discovered, that John Ford—whose filmmaking career is among the most heavily chronicled in Hollywood history, with over two dozen biographies currently on the shelf—really was directing the action at Midway. A Navy commander on assignment to the Office of Strategic Services,...
So I trekked (again) to the Film Academy’s Margaret Herrick Library, to learn where Ford actually fit in the Midway battle.
Apologies to Emmerich. I stand corrected. His brief portrayal of Ford at Midway in June 1942 was, if anything, understated.
Film scholars will know, but I only discovered, that John Ford—whose filmmaking career is among the most heavily chronicled in Hollywood history, with over two dozen biographies currently on the shelf—really was directing the action at Midway. A Navy commander on assignment to the Office of Strategic Services,...
- 11/13/2019
- by Michael Cieply
- Deadline Film + TV
Midway, directed by Roland Emmerich, is a kinda-remake of a not-very-good movie from 1976 about the impressive World War II battle. For as consequential as the Battle of Midway was, let us hope there will one day be a feature film to properly match the subject matter. The first Midway, directed by Jack Smight, starred some of the biggest–and oldest–stars at the time: Charlton Heston, Henry Fonda, and Robert Mitchum, to name a few. This new one is a little lighter on the star power. There’s Dennis Quaid, Aaron Eckhart, and a wig-heavy Woody Harrelson to be sure, but the majority of screen time is devoted to a younger set of talent.
Ed Skrein leads the ensemble, playing a cocksure soldier named Dick Best. It is a character name that, was it not based on a real-life hero, would be a bit too much. But then, it does fit here.
Ed Skrein leads the ensemble, playing a cocksure soldier named Dick Best. It is a character name that, was it not based on a real-life hero, would be a bit too much. But then, it does fit here.
- 11/9/2019
- by Dan Mecca
- The Film Stage
Roland Emmerich is exactly the right and exactly the wrong filmmaker to make a movie about the Battle of Midway, one of the great turning points in World War II. Few filmmakers can match Emmerich’s eye for excess, and there’s no denying that he fills his film with breathtaking images of aerial action and naval warfare.
But like many of Emmerich’s movies, even the better ones, “Midway” loses sight of the humanity inside its vast vistas of devastation. It’s a giant film with a very small impact.
“Midway” opens with a few brief moments of quiet before, with an undeniably appropriate suddenness, Japan bombs Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941. Emmerich coats the screen in detailed destruction and sudden heroism, but he races through the day that lives in infamy in record time, with all the pomp of Bay’s “Pearl Harbor” and slightly less of the schmaltz.
But like many of Emmerich’s movies, even the better ones, “Midway” loses sight of the humanity inside its vast vistas of devastation. It’s a giant film with a very small impact.
“Midway” opens with a few brief moments of quiet before, with an undeniably appropriate suddenness, Japan bombs Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941. Emmerich coats the screen in detailed destruction and sudden heroism, but he races through the day that lives in infamy in record time, with all the pomp of Bay’s “Pearl Harbor” and slightly less of the schmaltz.
- 11/6/2019
- by William Bibbiani
- The Wrap
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