Johnny Got His Gun (1971)

 "I'll pray for him for the rest of my days. But I will not risk testing his faith against your stupidity."

Two things first. One: this film is one of the finest works of cinematic art to which I've been exposed, and I've blogged many hundreds of films. I'm very grateful to the lovely individual who introduced me to it. Two: yes, I've seen the video to Metallica's "One" probably hundreds of times. That means, firstly, that there were spoilers, although I don't think that matters and, secondly, that finding clips I recognised provided some relief from the beautiful yet cathartic horror of what this film is about.

It's an anti-war fim, yes, completely and absolutely; the end caption drives that home. But there is so much subtext here. The poetry of both the dialogue and the direction is painfully exquisite. The sheer horror of imagining oneself without eyes, nose, limbs, mouth, movement, yet forced to live one's natural span with nothing but interior life and what touch and feeling one is permitted. The ambiguity between dream and reality, with sedatives further blurring the lines. The importance of kindness, a kiss on the forehead. The joy of sunlight. 

The longing for extinction. For this cannot be life.

Joe's dreams of the past- in colour, for the monochrome of the present has an obvioius symbolism- mix memory and surrealism. The sweet yet only time that he and Corrine, people of their time, in 1917, enjoy the union of their bodies. His innocence. The cynical evil of a world that, having communicated with him and registered his wish to die, keep him alone, secret, to live and suffer. The frustrated kindness of the nurse and his love for her. 

It's hard to process, shortly after a first viewing, how much meaning there is in this film.But it is magnificent, cathartic, beautiful.