Arkansas Travelers: Guard Unit's Life in Iraq
By NED MARTEL
A year after hundreds of embedded journalists broadcast the hustle and muscle of United States troops in Iraq, two filmmaking brothers have found a brave and apt use for the military's languishing program of allowing tag-alongs.
In "Off to War," Craig and Brent Renaud not only trudge behind enemy lines with newly called up National Guard members from Arkansas, but also follow wives and mothers playing a desultory waiting game back home. In this startling, understated three-part documentary, all of which will be shown tonight, soldiers and their families voice feelings of confusion and estrangement.
Like their subjects, the Renauds are young (in their early 30's) and also hail from Arkansas. This kinship has sparked some worthwhile candor, in this most intimate and memorable look at Americans in the Iraqi conflict. "I really don't want to be here," one soldier says when he has heard that another gunner in his convoy has shot an Iraqi who was driving a car. The Iraqi had brandished what appeared to be gun but was merely a cigarette lighter.
To complicate matters, a pregnant passenger in the Iraqi's car went into labor after the shooting. "Every time we leave this truck, it's a terrifying experience," another soldier says.
Before one patrol, a chalk talk from a superior includes these instructions: "Be polite. Be professional. And be prepared to kill." But sometimes sarcasm seems their only armor: "Another wonderful day" or "O.K., let the good times roll." A reading of Psalms keeps an officer's mind on a higher path. Soldiers make an effort to smile amid throngs of Iraqis, some of whom are peddling pornographic DVD's. The troops offer bottles of Gatorade to little boys because "if we're winning the hearts and minds of these kids, in the future they won't be shooting at us," First Lt. Brian Mason says.
Many of the Guard members come from farm backgrounds, and one soldier notes that an Iraqi prison that they have taken over is grim and inadequate this way: "I wouldn't put my dog or a horse in a pen like this." And though they possess ample firepower, the captors often come off as captives. In barracks that resemble a tightly packed trailer park, they put on Kevlar vests and huddle in cramped bunkers when incoming mortar fire interrupts their sleep.
The filmmakers are never seen or heard in the footage, but they are attentive to vulnerability. A turkey farmer's wife and daughter assume his chores while he's away, but the women's arms lack the oomph to toss chicks out of their crate.
One sardonic soldier, Matt Hertlein, comes off as a latter-day Yossarian, cracking wise about futility and fear in the ranks as well as his new camel-calling skills. A frustrated military wife tells members of her support group, "My husband sent me the truth about Muslims: they like candy." She vows to send Fireballs.
In an especially graceful sequence, a minister-turned-soldier records a video letter to his family, and ends with a tearful "I miss you greatly." When his wife and kids watch the tape in their living room, it feels like a new era of connectedness during wartime, aided by audiovisual technology but with all the poignancy of those Civil War letters that Ken Burns once dramatized. "Off to War" commits not merely to telling war stories, but also to understanding families and their sacrifices. "Mama, Mama, can't you see/ What this Army's doing to me?" the soldiers chant while running. The closing scene is a Mother's Day phone call, captured on both ends of the conversation. Like the worried mother, the filmmakers perceive dangers large and small: as the soldier climbs a ladder to get better reception on a rooftop, the laces of his high-top basketball shoes are not tied.
'Off to War'
DISCOVERY TIMES, tonight at 6, Eastern and Pacific times; 5, Central time.
Jon Alpert, executive producer; Craig Renaud and Brent Renaud, producers, reporters, camera and audio.
Copyright 2004 The New York Times
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