Great Movie
Its Thanksgiving and I got a chance to catch up on my Netflix selection.
“Merry Christmas” is a 2005 French / German / British production about a real life occurrence during WW1.
It is the story of how it came to be that an entire section of the Western Front entered into a spontaneous truce on Christmas eve 1914. People who were sworn enemies and just hours earlier didn’t think twice about killing one another, ended up singing Christmas carols, exchanging presents, attending a service and even playing soccer.
Aside from the somewhat miraculous story itself, the director makes a greater point about the mental state of soldiers at war.
All throughout these past years I have often wondered about our war in Iraq. What bugs me is the fact that I myself – Joe Nobody in Los Angeles – had seen several reports and predictions by Iraq experts that indicated the outcome of the war and the vacuum left by Saddaam would be a Civil War with sectarian violence and utter chaos. Now if I knew this, you can bet your last dollar that our elected leadership knew this equally well and probably much better. War sucks. I admire the soldiers who can fight it even though they may not agree with it or with their leadership. In “Merry Christmas” the French Lieutenant (far left in the picture) tells hid dad who also happens to be a Major General “I have more n common with those poor bastards in the trenches on the other side than those fat people who stuff themselves with turkey and pontificate about the war “ Our own soldiers have frequently said that in war you fight for the guy next to you, not necessarily the generals, the political leadership or the folks back home. I am not a pacifist, but I sure don’t like senseless war. And to me our entire effort in Iraq was one big misguided mess at so many levels its not even funny.
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