Attention Entertainment Industry: Stop Portraying Us
Dear Decision Makers in the Entertainment Industry,
For years you have been portraying the American service member incorrectly in all that you do. I don't know why you continue to do so and have actors/actresses portraying military when there are tons of veteran, reserve, guard and active duty actors/actresses who would add authenticity to these roles and would prevent them from being portrayed incorrectly. There is just no possible way that someone can understand what it's like to be in the military without them ACTUALLY being in the military. It just can't be done. I don't care if you send your actor to nine weeks of boot camp or embed yourself with a unit for months at a time. A person changes when they sign their life away on that famous dotted line...an evolution happens inside a person...and you can never know what that evolution is like unless you've personally experienced it yourself.
Something happens to you when you sign up and decide to serve your country...when you take that step to serve a cause higher than your own. You know full well that there is a chance you are going to war...that you could die...but instead of giving in to that human desire for self-preservation and survival, you deliberately go against that instinct and sign up to potentially sacrifice your life for ANY cause the American people deem worthy of sending you, and others like you, to die for no matter your personal belief.
This is a profound event in a person's life and the only thing I could compare it to is being a woman, being disabled, or being any other ethnicity or race other than my own. There is no possible way for me to know what it's like to be a woman or black or a Native American or to be paralyzed from the waist down and that is what it is like for a service member. It might sound silly, but casting a woman AS a woman is a necessity because it adds authenticity to that role. Casting Native Americans as Native Americans adds authenticity to that role. Casting a person with disabilities in a person with disabilities role adds authenticity to that role. And finally, casting a military veteran or service member in a military role will authenticate that role because ONLY THEY KNOW WHAT IT IS LIKE.
This goes the same for music. Unless you've been there, don't put out a song about war or the service members. It is much too complicated. You either miss the entire point or make it seem like a movie. We never want to go to war and we fight purely out of an instinct to protect the men and women we serve with. The overwhelming emotions are not what they are commonly portrayed as and NOT every service member that goes over to Iraq and Afghanistan is a hero! A hero is someone who jumps on a grenade or pulls his buddies from a sure death or jumps out and saves innocent civilians from being killed. That is a hero. I am not a hero. I went to Iraq with my unit, went out and interacted with Iraqis every single day and did what I thought was right. Period. It is enough to say that I am a war veteran and even then I am not so sure I am, because I was never actually engaged in a firefight. These are all the complicated issues and thoughts in every single service member's mind and course through our veins. These types of emotions and feelings do however come out, expressed in our music or in our movies or in everyday life and conversation...but we are never asked about them or asked to share them with the public.
Instead we are portrayed on screens and on radios across the country by people who have no clue who or what we are. This is unfortunate because the talent does exist. I represent over 1,200 military musicians who, given the proper studio and backing, could blow the doors off the garbage that's on the radio today. It's just sad that some people would think that everyday Americans would rather hear from an actor PLAYING a soldier about the war, than the actual soldier fighting it. I hear Ryan Phillipe talk about the Stop Loss/Stop Movement Program and the effects it has on service members and I cringe. It's also sad that there is not ONE song from an actual service member that is playing on the radio today...not ONE. Not one song about him missing his family, his friend that was killed, being in a foreign land, being scared, his anxiety, fear, exhilaration, hope, feelings, or emotions...sadly...not one. Of course there are a lot of songs being made "dedicated" to the service members that talk about them being heroes and patriotism, because that's the current fad.
Ladies and gentlemen, we do exist. Please stop portraying us.
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correction: You don't have to be a whore to play one.
Preposterous.
You, just like everyone else, are just a human being.
No one don't have to be a whore to play one.
No, I wasn't calling you a whore.
Retired military, Gulf War veteran.
Don't blame the actors for Hollywood doing a lousy job writing stories. Today's movies are no more realistic than the propoganda we were shown in the 40s 50s 60s, 70s and 80s. Servicemen are either portrayed as one dimensional heroes or near lunatics.
John Wayne presented an unrealistic image as I'm sure Ryan Phillipe does.
The problem is how to make a movie that is realistic (not from a blood and guts angle) and still draws people to the box office. Pretty tough to do. And you've got to do it in an appealing time (90 minutes, 2 hours max).
So this movie tries to compress PTSD, strain on family, horror of war, and what amounts to be a secret draft that is entertaining and thought provoking.
What I found hardest in the very clean war I played a bit role in was adjusting to life back in the States. Our society is so affluent and the people so far removed from the realities of most of the world. It made me long in a very perverse way for the simplicity of the war. That life seemed purer.
I had a classmate who was older than me and it wasn't until the Gulf War that I understood why he volunteered for 3 back to back tours in Vietnam. And he was in a unit that saw lots of combat (unlike me).
Desert Storm veteran and I do get a lot of what Gilfillan is saying - it IS only vets who understand the experience, and it IS sometimes very cringe-worthy to listen to some singer, actor, or even politician try to express that experience when it's very obvious they just don't get it. A lot of creative types DO take the old shortcut of romanticizing soldiers, patriotism, duty, and war itself - I think THAT was the point Galifillan was intending to make, it just got lost somewhere in the post.
Galifillan is wrong on a couple of things, though. Just as not everyone is cut out to be a soldier, not everyone is cut out to be an actor. And while actors might not completely understand our experience, that's not their job - their job is expressing the experience while entertaining. If a veteran feels a movie or song get's it wrong, don't buy the ticket or CD. Make a point to not only patronize those folks who do get it right, but tell your friends so THEY can get it, too.
Galifillan is also wrong about not being a hero. He took the oath and manned a post, something ninety percent of the country's never done. That's what makes him a hero, not medals - the willingness to do the right thing when it could get you killed. Learned that from a chaplain in '91.
Whatever. My good conduct medal says I'm a hero. Ditto the McDonald's ribbon. :)
Ha ha, that's what's up. And Sean knows what's up too. Why, cuz we've been there...signed that dotted line. And although I've never heard it as the "McDonald's ribbon", I know exactly what you're talking about. Nuff said, I think that's Sean's point.
OIF/VET/USMC
Keith,
Thanks for your service. You are correct in saying not everyone can be an actor. I guess I was trying to highlight the fact that there HAS to be some good veteran actors out there....right?....I can name about 5 dudes I served with who acted tougher than Chuck Liddell!
I also think I might have been off in my criticism as noted in some of the comments below. Maybe my beef IS with the writers and directors and how they portray the military. I was seeing actors talking about the Stop-Loss Movement and was upset because it should be the soldiers themselves speaking about that topic. That would make it more relevant. I think it always makes a topic more powerful when you can bring in the actual subject of the debate to talk about it him/herself. And we DO exist out there. It just takes some time and effort to find us.
My bad...this is just my first post so I'll improve as I go on!
Thanks for calling me a hero, Keith, but it's still hard for me to swallow. I honestly just did what I thought was right out there and I think many of us did. Those were some tough conditions to be put under, especially in the beginning with the lack of strategic level planning at the top, but the guys I was with were unbelievably adaptable and flexible and anything I ever did I owed to them.
It's hard for me to swallow, too, and it's been 10 years since I got my papers saying I was done and 17 since I was in country. I still don't know what to say when people thank me for my service, especially when those folks are 'Nam vets who went through so much more than I did was much less support. All veterans did the same thing, though - we stood up to counted when most folks didn't. That's a rare and special thing - don't underrate that.
And to gsuescum: Bush went to the front of a 2-year waiting list to keep from serving in a conflict his father supposedly supported - that's NOT standing up to be counted, that's called hiding behind your daddy's purse strings. How anyone bought into his and his flunkies' contentions that Gore and Kerry were somehow less patriotic stuns me to this day. I may not agree with McCain's views on what he'd do as president, but he does have my respect and gratitude for having walked the walk.
I agree with a lot you say but what's the cut off for being a "hero?" I like what Galifillan says about a hero being someone who does something heroic and that he doesn't consider himself a hero but someone who just did his duty. If all you have to do is wear a uniform then Bush is as much a war as a guy who jumped on a gernade.
Are we at the point where we treat soldiers like the Gen Y kids who were patronized with the whole "you're so special" treatment from their parent, teachers, etc.?
Up yours. Seriously.
No one is suggesting that someone gets the Medal of Honor for going overseas. but don't even DARE suggest that dressing up like a soldier is the same thing as serving. I served for 6 years, but I don't consider myself a hero. That doesn't mean that what I did is common or easy. Moreover, plenty of people who served saw more combat than me and deserve more accolades than me.
None of that stems from some misguided need to praise mediocrity. And none of it is meant to diminish the actions of people who gave the full measure of their devotion in the past. You should feel ashamed of yourself.
You begin with very senible comments and observations. Then you become nonsensical over your idiosyncratic defintion of "hero." A simple look at history demonstrates how wrong your defintion is. Some German men took their oaths and manned their posts....as guards at concentration camps. They were heros? American soldiers guarded the Japanese-American internment camps. They were heros? What if one of the German or American camp guards had refused their assigned duty? Would you call them cowards and traitors?
Is the "right thing" regarding Iraq to go there and kill people who never harmed America, or to accept courts marital and prison terms by refusing to make enemies of people who never hurt us?
Try thnking about what the term "right thng" really means.
How does 'history' reject his view of what a hero is? I mean....if you assume that every soldier in Iraq is just as culpable of crimes as guards at Dachau, then I can't convince you otherwise. all I can say is that the fact that you hold this opinion is a sad testament to our nation.
The actions that we should castigate are those of the bush administration, not the soldiers in Iraq. We should be FURIOUS at Bush and company for taking the promise of service that millions of Americans gave TO THEIR COUNTRY and pissing it away. We shouldn't be directing vitrol at these boys and men (and women) because they didn't abandon their word and their nation. When I joined I offered an oath to the country and to the constitution. That meant that I would follow legal orders even if I disagreed with them. To do otherwise would have let down my friends, my command and myself.
A vanishingly small percentage of US Troops have undertaken war crimes. they should have known better, but the blame doesn't lie on them alone and it certainly doesn't somehow move transitively to any other troops serving. Don't attempt to tar their memory by invoking genocide.
As a former military man myself, I see and respect your point. But I have to defend the actors at least a little. Actors act...that's their job. They can't help it that they didn't sign their life over to the government. If a good actor is successful, they can make us believe whatever character they portray. They portray soldiers, cowboys, athletes, musicians, you name it. It's their job to be someone they're not.
The real problem is many of these films are being written and directed by people who have no idea what they are talking about. A lot of actors go to the screenwriter (as well as the director, of course) for help in their performances. They usually want to play the characters accurately and with respect. It all boils down to the script. If it was written by an author who means well but is completely uninformed about men and women of the military, that will be portrayed on screen by the actors.
It's always beneficial to cast an actor who's an actual veteran. But if your trying to portray relatively young characters in the military, finding talented young actors with military experience may be rare indeed.
thanks for your service, 96Bravo. You are right on the money, bro. I think my beef IS with the writers and directors! Tom Hanks was the bomb in Saving Private Ryan. I gotta think the veteran talent DOES exist out there though. You just gotta go and find it.
I think my real beef is with the current crop of Iraq war movies that are not documentaries.
Thanks, Sean. Serving my country was my pleasure (well, except for the running...I hate to run).
I would like to see more veterans make it in Hollywood. I think of guys like James Stewart and Michael Caine as great actors who've served in combat.
96Bravo, thank you for your service. I have to respectfully disagree with you on actors. They CAN help that they didn't sign on the dotted line for service. They CHOSE NOT to, just as my son, you, other friends & countless others chose to.
I agree with the viewpoint of the clueless writers. Their job is to do the research, talk to people in the areas they are writing about. That is the job of ANY writer, whether they write screenplays or books. The more research done, the better the story. It has to be incredibly well-written to be able to do convince people to overlook history. To be honest, there just is not much writing of that calibre coming out of Hollywood. We are seeing our older, better, TRAINED actors are dying ...we've lost 3 in the last 3 weeks. And no one of that cailbre is replacing them.
Sean, I know that you do not see yourself as a hero - but to me and thousands of other Americans, you are. You have stepped up to protect us and that is more than some of us have done. As my son has enlisted, and some friends, my job is to defend your hearts here at home and support them in any way that I can.Thanks, from the bottom of my heart.
Remember this: Movies are either documentaries or they are fiction. If they are fiction, the writer has the freedom to tell whatever story he or she imagines will entertain the audience. If you want to see better movies about servicemen and women, WRITE A GOOD SCRIPT, GET AN AGENT, SELL THE SCRIPT, AND SEE IT PRODUCED AND DISTRIBUTED AS A MOTION PICTURE. What's so hard about that?
"WRITE A GOOD SCRIPT, GET AN AGENT, SELL THE SCRIPT, AND SEE IT PRODUCED AND DISTRIBUTED AS A MOTION PICTURE. "
Ummm. Seems hard to me.
And I agree that artistic license gives the authors of fiction the room to portray characters however they feel. I think that at the heart of this guy's complain is a sense that there is a large authenticity gap between what actually happens in the military and what is portrayed. Large enough that anyone with military experience would balk at the movie even as a work of fiction.
I don't agree with the OP, insofar as I feel that actors can portray military men and women with good coaching and good screenwriting. But I feel compelled to disagree with your broad view of what fiction should and should not be like. Simply because fiction may show military members a certain way does not mean that it should be that way.
The point I was trying to make is that it is a lot easier to criticize than to do. Any movie has flaws. When I watch servicemen and women being portrayed on screen, I USUALLY CRINGE. The scripts are so off-base that they run the gamut from totally silly to utterly revolting--and only rarely approach the truth. But, as someone who has written a LOT of fiction (which I'm gamely trying to sell), I can only say that if you want good movies, if you want them to portray the TRUTH, then WRITE, DIRECT, AND PRODUCE THEM YOURSELF! That's the only way you get control of the medium and create the vision you believe is ACCURATE.
Most of the time it is the writers, the directors and the advisors that are to blame. Take Crimson Tide (sigh). Their advisors were both Captains in the navy (o-6), pretty far removed from basic life for the crew but well connected to the task of explaining how a ballistic missile sub operates. Consequently we have an.....ok....(not good) depiction of some of the high level stuff but a TERRIBLE shot at life on the submarine.
When that movie showed the supply officer forcing a sailor to "drop" and do pushups I nearly laughed myself out of the movie theater. Maybe the boomer fleet is different, but if the supply officer on my boat told me to drop I think I would have died laughing.
the actor didn't want that. The actor didn't know any better. He's got a view of the navy that came from watching a few good men and probably some WWII movies. The advisors should have known better.
Good point, Protonk. I think you are right.
Yeah, to be fair, I'm not ragging on you personally (and I hope it doesn't look like that )
I wonder how a ship's captain would respond to you laughing at an order given by an officer. MY bet, you'd be punished, and the officer written up in private. The only order you can safely refuse is one that would endanger the ship, or others, for no legitimate reason.
During your basic training, were you given instruction on what types of oders you could ignore or laugh at, especially aboard a Navy vessal underway?
As I understand it, an officer *CAN* order others to do stupid things and get away with it, until the commanding officer learns of this behavior. Then that officer suddenly becomes a civilian with a bad conduct discharge.
I have saw "Crimson Tide" on TV but don't remember the pushup scene. The movie seemed rather stupid to me, so I paid little attention to it.
You can wonder. I can know. It's that cool about how my experience informs my comments? I served on a submarine for 4 years and never felt that 'the chop' (the supply officer) was going to give some silly order like that.
Also, lets get a few things clear.
Movies are not real life.
Basic training is not the rest of military service.
Military justice is a hell of a lot more complicated than you have just attempted to summarize. either way, your tone isn't really becoming of someone asking questions. You presume to know more about my experiences than you actually do. You even go so far as to tell me what orders I could and could not safely refuse and under what conditions.
Why don't we just accept that you might not be an expert on how enlisted personnel interact with officers and chiefs in the submarine force. Lets further accept that this lack of expertise isn't a FAULT of yours, it just stems from different life experiences. so if you have questions I'm happy to answer them but otherwise I don't think that your uninformed speculation is terribly helpful.
Sean, you have done us a service. A majority of the comments on your blog are well written, thoughtful, & logical. Even an alogical blog can induce intelligent comments as your blog does. Thank you.
larry lynch
Thanks Larry. Just trying to shed some light on an issue and start a conversation.
Write a script. It isn't the actors it is the writers. Acting isn't about being authentic it is about being believable. If you think the portrayals are false then write a script, write a song. Step to the mike creatviely. Every actor isn't an expert in what he is doing. Al Pacino wasn't in the mob, Joe Pesci wasn't either, but they play believable characters, they take good scripts and translate them. Writers attempt accuracy but to the writer plot is more important than getting it write. Verasimilitude is almost real but not quite. Because there are reasons to combine characters from books, to make your jet pilot also skilling a sniper shooting. They don't make a lot of sense to someone not in the biz but there are reasons for the choices people make. Stop-loss was a mistake, an argument rather than a movie, and it failed because of that. I'm interested in a list of good movies about war, realistic ones. Other than blackhawk down I can't think of a modern war movie that spoke to me. Anyone else?
J
I am a Viet Nam veteran. I wanted to get that out first because this is one of the most ridiculous posts I have ever seen.
Actors act, singers sing, and composers compose. The professionals do it best. Did it take Viet Nam vets to make Apocolypse Now or Hamburger Hill? No. Was it vets who wrote and sang the classic anti-war songs? No.
Have there been vets who became actors? Yes. Lee Marvin was a marine and a fine actor in military and other rolls. Glen Ford was a navy vet and a fine actor. Audie Murphy was a Medal of Honor winner who played himself in "To Hell and Back" and then had a career in Westerns.
But were Matt Damon or Tom Hanks veterans? No. Was "Saving Private Ryan" a great movie? Yes.
Thank you for your service, Sean (which is more than we Viet Nam vets got), but get over it. I prefer to see professional actors in movies and professional singers sing.
I'm glad that someone else w/ time in the military can say something about this post. It is nihilistic to assume that only people who have experienced something wholly can depict it.
If we take Sean's argument at face, then only cancer survivors can make movies about cancer, only a failure at life could play Willy Loman, only drug addicted con man could play Ratso Rizzo.
Here's the hard part. The military fosters this attitude of exclusiveness. It isn't a bad thing, it is a key component of esprit de corps. You need to know that no one else is experiencing what you are and that the experience can't be duplicated. In some ways it can't, but in many ways it is not as far removed from other experiences as we are lead to believe. Think about how you were treated in boot camp. think about how they took pains to break you down and build up a brotherhood. Think about how many times you have sheltered yourself from the outside world by leaning on the people in your unit.
that isn't an accident. We are trained to feel that anyone who has shared our experience is demonstrably better than others. When you find out that someone did the same job as you in the military, you soften to them instantly. when you find out they never served, you close up. It is part of the life and part of the training.
You are right Knighthowl. Thanks for your service too bro. My beef should be with the writers and directors. Saving Private Ryan was an awesome movie. I get upset because they don't interview soldiers who actually were effected by Stop-Loss, but actors who play soldiers who are effected by Stop-Loss. It's not like they don't exist.
Good for you Sean! However standing between our entertainment industry and a buck is a battle which is yet to be won. They'll prance, pander and preen until no one buys it. That's the only thing which will stop their foolish, conceited drivel.
Well they would make more if the movie was authentic and good! Right?
Well, I was disappointed with what I heard about stop-loss, and I agree that we need a good war movie, but it is more important that the screenwriter/writers and possibly the director are vets than the actors. If you take a bunch of vets and have a director make them read lines for a war movie written by a non-vet, you will just get more of the same.
The funny thing is that I am writing an article right now about a band called Chasing Corona which is being played on our local radio station. Their Singer was on the Cole when it was hit, and the Guitarist was "next door," on a nearby ship in the gulf. That is where they met, in the gulf. So be careful saying that vets are not on the radio-well, those guys are both still serving, so maybe they are not vets (grin).
You are right, Aaror. Chasing Corona is a band that has submitted for our compilations.
You might like other military bands we represent as well www.tothefallenrecords.com as we have over 1500.
We do have a huge push for military music on local radio, satellite, internet radio, etc. What I meant is that these artists have no chance when it comes to being pushed on Top 40, unless they have $100,000 to push their single.
I think if we, the lowlifes that didn't enlist, cared what it was really like to be a soldier, we'd have enlisted.
Movies are escapism. If I want realism I turn the tv off and go outside.
Sigh.
Movies aren't just about escapism. Let's accept for a minute that not everyone enjoys things for the same reason you might. Some people just want to escape into fantasy. Some people want verisimilitude. Some people want catharsis. Presumably it is not out of bounds to ask that film makers satisfy more than one of those desires.
I'd tell you how the notion of authenticity ties in with emotional connection and the tension between expectations and what happens on the screen helps to drive both comedy and tragedy but I'd probably be wasting my time.
It's called acting. Not documentary. There are plenty of actors out there who served, but they don't get top billing, mostly because your average actor makes barely enough to live on. The good ones usually get steady work as extras, background people. Many actors do their due diligence and research the characters, and in order to portray that reality believably translate the characters experience to something that they can focus on. Doesn't have to be the actual event to achieve verissimilitude.
Damn. I actually had to look up your last word! A+ for vocab usage! I think you are right though and my beef is actually with the writers and directors.
Best jingo song ever??? "Freedom Isn't Free" Team America Soundtrack
"Freedom costs a buck-o-five."
-USMC Vet 98-Present
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Posted April 3, 2008 | 08:23 PM (EST)