The War
The
War, Directed by Jon
Avnet, portrays several underlying themes and extended metaphors. The father,
Stephen Simmons, returns home from the Vietnam War with intentions to rebuild
his life with his family, but is also fighting a challenge of his own, post-traumatic
stress. The father wants to be a role model for his children, and teaches them
that love is the only thing worth fighting for; “the only thing that keeps
people truly safe and happy is love.” (Stephen) The film displays the reality
of post- traumatic stress, and presents an important life lesson on picking the
right battles to fight.
Post-traumatic stress is no fake mental
health condition. This film shows the
severity of PTS and how hard it is to return to a “normal life” after
experiencing one or more terrifying events.
Stephen often dreams about his time in the Vietnam War and can never
stop thinking about how he left his friend to die. Stephen feels like he has to make up for his
wrongs by being the best dad he can be.
“They’re gonna make a difference in the world… that means I made a
difference.” (Stephen) This quote shows
that the only way Stephen can recover from PTS is make sure that his children
think they can accomplish anything. Only
then he will feel like he has done something meaningful to his life.
Happiness and peace is found by choosing the
best way to go about an issue. The film
relates the conflicts from the Vietnam War to the current conflicts of the feud
between the Simmon’s and the Lipnicki's.
Stephen’s son, Stu, is constantly getting into fights with this other
group of kids. Stu eventually learns to
put his emotions towards the greater good, after he learns from his and his
father’s experiences of war. “War is
like a big machine that no one really knows how to run and when it gets out of
control it ends up destroying the things you thought you were fighting for, and
lot of other things you kinda forgot you had.” (Lidia) A good example of this was when the two
groups were fighting over the tree house.
In the end, the tree house is destroyed, and during the battle, Stu sees
the pointless fighting all around him.
He realizes that his mind was clouded with ignorance and anger after his
father’s death. He then looks to the
most important issue at hand, saving Billy from drowning in the water
tower. Overall, Stu showed an act of
courage by saving Billy and earned the respect of the Lipnicki’s. Just like his father did in that cave, Stu
risked his life to save another.
The lesson learned is to look past the
battle at hand, and strive for the solution that is beneficial for all. Stephen could never forgive himself for
leaving his fellow solider in the war, but redeemed himself by saving his
friends life in the cave. Stephen was
able to die at peace, now knowing that he did his job as an outstanding figure
for his family. Stu experienced a death
of a loved one, but was able to overcome his troubles in a positive way. Stu finally understands that fighting is
useless in the absence of love. The one
thing you can take away from this film is that it only, “takes a split second
for you to do something you’ll regret the whole rest of your life.”
(Stephen)
