Lee Archer comment on my comment

  

My two cents (in fact you can call me TwittyCent, rappin’ on Red Tails unseen):

I have a distinct feeling that accuracy is a McGuffin

 in the woodpile. Is the film any good? Does it work either as an action film or a drama of affirmation? They are directors who can handle both, find or “build” one.

While truth and accuracy can well buttress one another, they are not the same thing. Accuracy is a superb tool for making science and art, useful but inert. Art is fulfilled by truth. Does Red Tails portray the Tuskegee Airmen truthFULLY or  with mere accuracy?

Truth is less expensive than accuracy. Accuracy can be used to shape truth but you cannot pile accuracy or money high enough to make truth. You tell the tale within the budget you have, and truth is free, if hard earned. Does Red Tails tell the story of the Tuskegee Airmen well whatever its means?

Dealing with exposition sounds  like grad jargon, so I’ll just take my usual obdurate position (which if you change my mind will be my ex-position) of  Wha’ da hell ar’ ya ta’kin’ about?

“… where does the observer” [an non-disinterested party] “stand to report back one’s evaluation of such a movie? “ Is an interesting question; though personal disappointment and valid critical evaluation are not necessarily nullifying. Wish I could get into Diane’s second review: http://www.filmlinc.com/film-comment/article/red-tails-review.

I expected a  failure on some level, because you can’t serve whole whale at a sushi bar. The accurate story, well and truthfully told, had to be and still ought to be a mini-series. (Do maxi-series exist?) There are many truthful stories to be made into small or large films. But their success will be hard earned works-at-art.

They might’ve simply made a good war-action film based on the Airmen’s exploits, employing types; in the heat of  war, I believe types tend to be very similar: country boy, city boy, angry guy, nice guy, loud, quiet, etc. Simply having them played by young black men would be striking.

They might have focused the psychological drama more narrowly and efficiently on General, then Col., Davis. His father was the first black General in the US Army and Davis Jr. faced “silencing” for all four years at West Point. In this way you would avoid the problem of trying to choose between many and various heroes and telling their deep stories. You have B.O. ‘s trials and tribulations and the high (flying) adventures and antics of men like my father, Roscoe, Pruitt, etc. A whole film could be made about almost any Airmen.

Expositioning myself to the ridicule of the high muckity mucks of education,

lee