[Quick Summary: Near the end of WWII, Pulitzer Prize winning journalist Ernie Pyle follows troops, in the good and bad, as they liberate Italy.]
Journalist Ernie Pyle wrote in a way that brought his readers close to the troops. I was surprised at how this script did the same thing for me.
I'm glad that the writers did not focus on politics or the problems of an on-going war.* Instead, they focused on what these soldiers really fought for - each other.
All throughout the script, there is this feeling as if you belong, i.e., camaraderie. It shows up particularly in very small moments.
In the scene below:
- Notice how Murphy's death is handled tactfully, quietly.
- Mew, who has no family, had to fill out his insurance forms earlier.
- Notice how the scene speaks without words of taking care of each other.
Ernie looks at the corner where Murphy always sat. Then at Red's picture. Then at Mew, who slowly takes out his tattered insurance paper and a pencil, and starts to rub something out, following which we see the INSURANCE PAPER: Crossing out Murph's name, Mew changes the sum opposite Mrs. Murphy's name to $4000. The list now reads: Warnicki $2000; Junior $2000; Mrs. Murphy $4000.
WHAT I'VE LEARNED: I thought the Pyle character would be a throw away, but he was part of that camaraderie He showed that it mattered to tell these soldiers' stories.
Story of G.I. Joe (1945)
by Leopold Atlas, Guy Endore, Phillip Stevenson
*When this film was made in 1944, WWII had not ended yet and Italy was still being liberated.
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