The Red Badge of Courage

Audie Murphy quite potently epitomises the fighting spirit of the young "Fleming" at the height of the US Civil War. He's most certainly not a coward, but he's no warrior either and as he becomes exposed to the repetitive, seemingly endless, horrors of the war he really isn't sure whether to stand and fight or run and hide. Even if he were to succumb to the later survival instinct and still survive, could he endure the consequent shame? If he steps up the mark, will it make him ever an angry and violent man? What's also clear here is the extent to which he is not alone amongst the solders of both sides, their officers - even the general, are all conflicted to an extent as the bodies mount amidst all the mud, splintered trees and tears. It's a curiously short film that rather offers us a baptism of fire as we are swiftly immersed in this young man's predicament, but therein lay the problem for me. I didn't know him, nor much about him and as the story developed I felt way too much detail and character were missing as we raced along to a denouement that was never really in doubt. The production looks good, conveying effectively the grubbiness of their battles and their dependance on beans, but that lack of detail and the slightly documentary feel to the photography left me wondering if this wasn't just a bit of a school history lesson tempered with a bit of God-fearing. I quite liked Murphy as an actor, easy on the eye and never troubling to the brain, and he does enough here but on the whole I felt there was way more missing than not.