Time and place are established with footage of a fighter jet flying low over a village. The camera is following the plane. Soft piano music provides the only sound. The plane releases two bombs that tumble end-over-end to the ground, and the explosion that follows can only be napalm. The angle is exchanged for one that is forward of the plane; more bombs are loosed by twos; more explosions erase fields and huts with spurts of flame that send debris and sparks soaring in the air so high that they nearly leave the frame. The piano plays the melody that anticipates the melancholy this scene should cause. There is no message; only fire.
Werner Herzog's Rescue Dawn is an episode in the life of Dieter Dengler, a U.S. airman who was shot down over Laos and subsequently captured during a top secret bombing raid behind Laotian lines. The U.S. was not supposed to be flying over Laos, let alone bombing there, and this fact is stressed by the ranking officer during a briefing that precedes the sortie. As if to underline the foreboding that this situation should inspire, the next scene depicts the airmen watching a video about surviving in the jungle after being shot down; one of the viewers provides a sarcastic commentary and incites everyone to laughter. Anyone familiar with Dengler's story going into the film knows what lies ahead, and the scene suggests a mixture of bravado and nerves. Later on, Dieter and his friends make a huddle against the bulwark of the carrier and voice their hopes for a safe return. It feels like the kind of ritual that people might do in the face of something unknown and frightening.
Dieter's flight over Laos is claustrophobic and cramped; you can barely see through his cockpit, and I had to wonder how he saw anything at all. There's the target, a muffled voice intones, and I actually shifted in my reclining seat in an attempt to look past his avionics. His plane is shot without dramatic effect. Could this be what it was like up there? The camera stays with him throughout his plummet and the crash compresses right before your eyes. It's less than six minutes of cinema, and in that time I felt like I saw things that I hadn't before.
After Dieter is captured he is given a choice that challenges his principles. He sides with what is Right, and is tortured. He is subject to bullying and degradation and deprivation. People yell at him and he can't understand what they are saying; sometimes he yells back when it starts to get to him, and in these moments I was surprised by his blunt rebuttals. Strange as it is to write this, these exchanges developed his character early on in the film – which is important, because Dieter's capture occurs early on in the story, and we've barely gotten to know him. When he is transferred to a camp holding other Americans and English-speaking allies, we learn more about him. He is optimistic. He is resourceful. He is patient. He is a leader.
One of the things about the depiction of camp life that really struck me was the way that Dieter and his fellow prisoners talk. Sometimes their exasperation comes out in day-to-day speech, and they laugh with a strange, high pitch. Their voices go up and down the register without context. They sit close to each other even when they are unshackled, and sometimes they speak with their arms motionless at their sides, and other times they make wide gestures that nearly send them off their perch. These are men animated by circumstances that we can only begin to imagine, even as they play out in front of us. It is a strained locomotion, and the actors who fill these roles play it with believable intent.
It's also interesting that this far away from the Vietnam War – over forty years since these events – the prison situation is portrayed in a straightforward manner. The wardens are short with the prisoners and untrusting. The prisoners do what they can to steal small comforts, and toe the line whenever someone is waving a gun in their face. The prison conditions are sparse and utilitarian. No scene implies the fetish for torture or masochism that is apparent in earlier films such as The Deer Hunter. I didn't even sense the "War is hell" theme; the prisoners are in their situation because they were captured by people sympathetic to the North Vietnamese cause, and they are interred because this keeps them off the battlefield. Everyone is here because they are at war.
This film inspires a visceral reaction to events. There were many moments when I tensed up because I was sure that something dreadful was about to happen. The obstacles that the prisoners face are huge. The countryside that surrounds them is strange and full of dangers and challenges that would try any person, let alone someone barefoot and starving. When forcing their way through thickets of grass, I could feel their struggle; walking by rocky streambeds, I looked at their dirty feet and scrunched my toes. All of this is told with a spare direction that conveys toil and the passage of time and the abrupt nature of violence. Silence is frequently employed, and it is the perfect counterpoint to what's going on. In fact, the only aspect of this film that felt off to me was the music: on occasion, it wasn't appropriate.
When it all comes to an end, it feels weird at first. I felt like there was a measure of "once upon a time" about this film, because it happens in places that seem worlds away, and Dieter goes through so much. What happens to him is credible and amazing at the same time, and this film tells it well. There is no message; only story.
7/26/07
