Hello, all! Since today is the last day of films about The Great War, and especially since we’re in the Volunteer State, it seemed apropos to me to recommend a film about perhaps the best known “vol” to serve in the entire American Expeditionary Force, SERGEANT YORK. If you’re interested, feel free to check out the trailer below… but, if you object, I really hope it’s conscientiously.
It probably isn’t unreasonable to assume that everyone here is at least somewhat familiar with the story of Alvin York. Even if you know the basics, the film delves a little more deeply into his initial struggles with serving and the different factors that ultimately led him to serve in The Great War. The film is quite similar to a more recent “biopic” about another conscientious objector turned hero/Medal of Honor recipient, and that’s HACKSAW RIDGE. Obviously, the more recent film benefits from being a bit more culturally contemporaneous to the modern-day filmgoer, and especially from more advanced filmmaking techniques [read: improved special effects], but the emotional core of the films are essentially the same. In short, while it isn’t a case of “if you’ve seen the one, you’ve seen the other,” it certainly is a case of “if you liked the one, you’ll like the other.”
Just as HACKSAW RIDGE does, SERGEANT YORK establishes its titular character quite squarely as being in dire need of redemption, and both films do a solid job of establishing how both characters achieved that vis-à-vis accepting a relationship with the Almighty through Christ. I have to confess having a tendency to be a bit more appreciative of films that incorporate that message, but am especially impressed by films that do so in the context of a war film. It might seem a little bit of a strange juxtaposition, telling a story like that in the context of a film featuring what may be the highest expression of man’s inhumanity to man, but maybe they’re not such strange bedfellows, after all. As they say, there are no atheists in foxholes. Or, to crib from a more recent quote, maybe you’ve “got to go through hell before you get to heaven” [apologies to Steve Miller].
The film is a little bit heavy on the backstory, particularly with establishing Alvin York as a crack shot [perhaps a call back to another Tennessee volunteer hero, Davy Crockett?] as well as his “road to Damascus”-like conversion experience and the consequences thereof. To wit, he struggles with the idea of serving as a soldier despite that pesky Sixth of The Ten Commandments: “Thou shalt not kill” [if you’re going with the King James Version]. Ironically [per the film, at least], the wind blows York’s Bible open to the part about rendering unto Caesar that which is Caesar’s. I’d have thought his pastor might have visited him to tell him that the proper translation of the verse is “Thou shalt not commit murder,” but hey, to-may-toe to-mah-toe, the story unfolds the same way, regardless.
And it’s a good story. It’s hard not to find a story where one man manages to capture almost an entire company of the enemy, but that’s exactly what happened here. What makes it even more compelling is that that very same enemy had just surrounded an entire battalion of US “doughboys” in the same Meuse-Argonne Offensive [featured in the film THE LOST BATTALION, which I mentioned in the write-up of PATHS OF GLORY yesterday]. But what makes it all the more compelling is the humility the man had despite being a bona fide war hero, wanting little more than to return home to the same simple life he’d known before the war.
And that’s about as good a definition of what a volunteer is as any, in my opinion. Combine that with two very solid performances [Gary Cooper winning an Oscar for his portrayal of York, and the typically outstanding Walter Brennan as his pastor], and you've got yourself a solid film. Enjoy!
Other films recommended:
[Day 1 - KINGDOM OF HEAVEN (Director's Cut); Day 2 - GLADIATOR; Day 3 - TROY; Day 4 - SPARTACUS; Day 5 - BRAVEHEART; Day 6 - MASTER AND COMMANDER: THE FAR SIDE OF THE WORLD; Day 7 - GLORY; Day 8 - GODS AND GENERALS; Day 9 - GONE WITH THE WIND; Day 10 - CAPITAINE CONAN; Day 11 - ALL QUIET ON THE WESTERN FRONT; Day 12 - GALLIPOLI; Day 13 - PATHS OF GLORY]
It probably isn’t unreasonable to assume that everyone here is at least somewhat familiar with the story of Alvin York. Even if you know the basics, the film delves a little more deeply into his initial struggles with serving and the different factors that ultimately led him to serve in The Great War. The film is quite similar to a more recent “biopic” about another conscientious objector turned hero/Medal of Honor recipient, and that’s HACKSAW RIDGE. Obviously, the more recent film benefits from being a bit more culturally contemporaneous to the modern-day filmgoer, and especially from more advanced filmmaking techniques [read: improved special effects], but the emotional core of the films are essentially the same. In short, while it isn’t a case of “if you’ve seen the one, you’ve seen the other,” it certainly is a case of “if you liked the one, you’ll like the other.”
Just as HACKSAW RIDGE does, SERGEANT YORK establishes its titular character quite squarely as being in dire need of redemption, and both films do a solid job of establishing how both characters achieved that vis-à-vis accepting a relationship with the Almighty through Christ. I have to confess having a tendency to be a bit more appreciative of films that incorporate that message, but am especially impressed by films that do so in the context of a war film. It might seem a little bit of a strange juxtaposition, telling a story like that in the context of a film featuring what may be the highest expression of man’s inhumanity to man, but maybe they’re not such strange bedfellows, after all. As they say, there are no atheists in foxholes. Or, to crib from a more recent quote, maybe you’ve “got to go through hell before you get to heaven” [apologies to Steve Miller].
The film is a little bit heavy on the backstory, particularly with establishing Alvin York as a crack shot [perhaps a call back to another Tennessee volunteer hero, Davy Crockett?] as well as his “road to Damascus”-like conversion experience and the consequences thereof. To wit, he struggles with the idea of serving as a soldier despite that pesky Sixth of The Ten Commandments: “Thou shalt not kill” [if you’re going with the King James Version]. Ironically [per the film, at least], the wind blows York’s Bible open to the part about rendering unto Caesar that which is Caesar’s. I’d have thought his pastor might have visited him to tell him that the proper translation of the verse is “Thou shalt not commit murder,” but hey, to-may-toe to-mah-toe, the story unfolds the same way, regardless.
And it’s a good story. It’s hard not to find a story where one man manages to capture almost an entire company of the enemy, but that’s exactly what happened here. What makes it even more compelling is that that very same enemy had just surrounded an entire battalion of US “doughboys” in the same Meuse-Argonne Offensive [featured in the film THE LOST BATTALION, which I mentioned in the write-up of PATHS OF GLORY yesterday]. But what makes it all the more compelling is the humility the man had despite being a bona fide war hero, wanting little more than to return home to the same simple life he’d known before the war.
And that’s about as good a definition of what a volunteer is as any, in my opinion. Combine that with two very solid performances [Gary Cooper winning an Oscar for his portrayal of York, and the typically outstanding Walter Brennan as his pastor], and you've got yourself a solid film. Enjoy!
Other films recommended:
[Day 1 - KINGDOM OF HEAVEN (Director's Cut); Day 2 - GLADIATOR; Day 3 - TROY; Day 4 - SPARTACUS; Day 5 - BRAVEHEART; Day 6 - MASTER AND COMMANDER: THE FAR SIDE OF THE WORLD; Day 7 - GLORY; Day 8 - GODS AND GENERALS; Day 9 - GONE WITH THE WIND; Day 10 - CAPITAINE CONAN; Day 11 - ALL QUIET ON THE WESTERN FRONT; Day 12 - GALLIPOLI; Day 13 - PATHS OF GLORY]
