Synopsis: One boring night on Amazon Prime, I stumbled across the 2015 Russian WWI flick Battalion. Woman warriors march to the front lines, bayonets fixed, ready to charge into no man’s land! As I watched the drama unfold, another movie came to mind; Wonder Woman (2017) charging the German lines. How do the two movies compare? Uhh… different would be putting it mildly. Yet, despite being so different, they go hand in hand. They offer insights on their own, but when put side by side, create a whole picture. Wonder Woman and Battalion are polar opposites and teach opposite lessons. But they both serve the same purpose; to overwrite a dark moment in history, replacing it with a fantasy that’s both inspirational and comforting.
War Games
Synopsis: A group of archeologists discovers the rambling diary of a tortured soul slowly going mad. There’s no consistent logic, coherent meaning, or even an apparent chronological order to the bizarre episodes scrawled across the tattered book’s pages. But nonetheless, the adventurers can’t help but digest the entire manifesto cover to cover. In The Man in a White Corolla, our unhinged protagonist was in uniform, sent away to a faraway war zone.
Now he’s back home, but still in uniform. This time around, he managed to cobble together a chapter that was close to lucid from beginning to end, quite an accomplishment for him. It’s a brief reflection on leadership, humility, and staying grounded in what’s in front of you. Is this really a reliable source for “staying grounded”…? Don’t lose the battle before you even leave the drawing board, as the old saying goes.