BROTHERS
Starring: Tobey Maguire, Jake Gyllenhaal, Natalie Portman, and Sam Shepard.
Directed: Jim Sheridan.
Rated M (Mature themes, violence and coarse language). 104 min.
Reviewed by Peter W Sheehan
NOMINATED for two Golden Globes, this dramatic movie is a remake of the 2004 Danish film Brodre directed by Susanne Bier.
The movie is directed by Jim Sheridan who gave us In the Name of the Father and My Left Foot, and in this film he demonstrates again that he is very adept at capturing the subtleties and intricacies of family relationships on screen.
Several emotional themes lie beneath the film’s plot-line.
Sam Cahill (Tobey Maguire) collects his brother, Tommy (Jake Gyllenhaal) from prison just before he leaves for duty in Afghanistan.
Sam wants to serve his country, and has his father’s admiration.
Tommy has just been released from prison for an attempted bank robbery, and despises war.
This is Sam’s fourth tour of duty abroad, and just before Sam leaves, the family has a reunion lunch, and the family dynamics become confrontational.
Tommy’s father, Hank (Sam Shepard) has stereotyped his two sons into the good and the bad, and his feelings show.
Sam departs, and while fighting in the war, his helicopter crashes and he is presumed dead.
Sam survives, however, and is captured and tortured by the Taliban.
Not knowing what has happened, Tommy becomes part of the life of Sam’s family, and he comforts Grace (Natalie Portman), Sam’s wife, and tries to help her and her two daughters.
There is a brief suggestion of romance between Grace and Tommy, but both draw back.
Sam returns from Afghanistan, and becomes obsessed with the notion that Grace and Tommy have had an affair.
Weakened by the stresses of war, Sam fights for sanity in the delusion he has created about the relationship between his wife and Sam.
The acting in the movie is uniformly excellent.
There are a number of themes that characterise the story.
At a superficial level, it deals with the affection and rivalry between two brothers, which are suggested implicitly by the title of the film.
At another level, it is about a love triangle between two brothers and the same woman.
At a much deeper level lies a quality movie about the stress suffered by soldiers who have fought in the Middle East which Sheridan uses to establish Bier’s original emphasis on family dynamics.
The focus on Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome and its effect on human relationships emerges as the main thrust of the movie.
This is not an anti-war film, but it shows vividly the enormous psychological pain of those who fight for their country, and who bring their emotional conflicts home.
The horrors of war have caused Sam’s personality to change, and we understand exactly Sam’s guilt over what happened to him in the war zone.
The potential power of the movie escalates as personal and family relationships radically alter, and feelings boil over.
Sam went off to war as the honourable brother and Tommy was the wayward sibling.
Although Sam has come home, he is now incapable of responding emotionally to his wife and family; he is too scarred by what happened to him and what he did in Afghanistan to cope, and the traumas he has gone through have robbed him of his humanity and moral certainty.
Tommy’s support of Grace and her family, however, have made him a much better human being, and, through his discovery of a giving and caring self, he finds personal meaning.
The film doesn’t resolve the conflicts, it just presents them and shows what can happen.
Sam’s final words linger poignantly – “I’ve seen the end of war. The question is, can I live again”?
This is an involving movie with some moments of great power.
It conveys its multiple themes well, but its main impact lies in the totally destructive effect war, killing and torture have on the humanity of a good man.
The film also conveys many positive moral messages about the need to sustain loving family relationships, the significance of understanding and difficult giving, and the power of love, commitment, and hope for healing.
Peter W Sheehan is an associate of the Australian Catholic Office for Film and Broadcasting.
