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Film · Warner Bros. · 1955

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Mister Roberts

56Watch it awake.

He wants the fighting, and a dull cargo ship is not automatically the lesser job.

The review

A lieutenant on a supply ship, far from the fighting, wants a transfer to a combat ship. The captain is small and cruel about a palm tree. The crew is bored into trouble. The dull job feels like an insult when other men are in the war. Wanting to go where men are dying is this story's idea of purpose. It is not automatically right, and I could feel the picture pulling me to clap anyway.

The cargo still has to move. That is the work, whether he is proud of it or not. Hating a petty captain is easy, and fair. Clapping because a man wants to leave his crew for a chance to be killed is a different vote. If we watch it, we can loathe the palm tree without saluting every request to go where the dying is.

Journal

Keep Mister Roberts in the record.

No house has filed a sentence for this yet.

Live Historic number 56. Yours can differ.

The glance

Household and Temperance are the thin ones.

Is a marriage, a parent, or a child a real life here, or just a prop?

This phone is set for a grown person, just me. Change the ages.

Consider this

Casablanca

68 instead of 56

Casablanca is still a war film, and it scores 68 instead of 56. What you gain is household: He honors a marriage that is not his.

The eight

8
Industry
The supply ship is real work, and he wants a combat job instead.
2
Household
No wife or child is the life; a bored crew is the company he has.
6
Piety
Conscience has to separate a cruel captain from a wish to leave.
6
Courage
He will risk death in combat, which may also be a flight from duty.
8
Republic
Captain, crew, and navy still owe one another a ship that functions.
4
Temperance
Boredom makes trouble, and the wish for battle is not put down.
6
Truth
The captain's small cruelty is plain; the transfer wish is not pure.
5
Stewardship
The cargo still feeds the war, whether or not he stays to move it.

Where to watch

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Live Historic · Mister Roberts · 56IMDb

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Film · 20th Century · 2022

Pass it on

Avatar: The Way of Water

56Watch it awake.

The warning is the same as the first film. The water is not a warehouse either.

The review

The first film said a forest is not inventory. This one moves the same sentence underwater, and the sentence is still true. Jake's trouble is that the war he joined has children now, and a father who made himself a weapon does not get to retire from it when the next boat comes.

The spectacle is the product. Stay for the father who would rather the children learn the reef than learn his war, and notice the film cannot help spending them on the war anyway. Take the warning. Do not take the three hours of fire as the point.

Journal

Keep Avatar: The Way of Water in the record.