Opinion The bombs within
Does the Oscar-nominated war movie resonate with veterans?
Cinematheque,a small art house theater here in Hanoi,isnt easy to find; its tucked down a long,narrow,dimly lit alley lined with motorbikes. At Cinematheque,I met up with two acquaintances,Lady Borton and Chuck Searcy,for a screening of The Hurt Locker. I was well aware of the historically loaded nature of the situation me,an Iraq war veteran,going to see a fictional film set in that war,in a land still marked by the horror of one of our previous wars,one that for many Americans was only experienced through other fictional films like Apocalypse Now,The Deer Hunter and Platoon.
In the summer of 2004 (while I was still in Iraq) I wrote a poem called The Hurt Locker it appeared in my book,Here,Bullet, published in 2005. Id first heard the phrase (which means,in a broad sense,a private place of pain) when my squad leader turned to me and voiced his frustration with so many indirect attacks on us (mortar attacks,roadside bombs,snipers,etc.). He said,Sometimes I just want to put them in the hurt locker. It was a bizarre phrase that stuck with me for about two weeks before I wrote the poem. Hearing the films title rekindled my curiosity in the phrase itself,sparking my interest.
Lady Borton is the author of many fine books,including After Sorrow: An American Among the Vietnamese. She helped both North and South Vietnamese children who were injured during the war get prosthetic limbs. (Shes currently the International Affairs Representative for the American Friends Service Committee in Hanoi.) Chuck is a Vietnam vet who returned in 1995 to work on reconciliation. Since 2000 hes worked with Project RENEW to deal with the problem of landmines and unexploded ordnance in central Vietnam.
Lady and Chuck and I stepped into the Hanoi night after the film,lingering curbside to talk about it.
I asked Chuck,who is humble and professional in speaking of his work,if the film resonated with him. He explained that de-mining in Vietnam now,in peacetime,is completely different: the removal of unexploded bombs and mines is done without the simultaneous layer of ongoing combat. Its done with great attention to safety measures. (Still,I remember the fall of his voice earlier in the night when he spoke of the sad loss of two de-mining experts.)
For me,watching The Hurt Locker brought back memories of among other things roadside bombs in Iraq. I recounted one of the insane jobs I had there. My platoon was tasked to patrol the city of Mosul and to make sure routes were clear. Wed stop short of spots along the way where bombs might be positioned (often in the trash and debris under freeway overpasses,for example). Our squad would then split up one fire team to each side of the road. Id walk down the shoulder with my team trailing me; Sgt. Zavala,my counterpart,likewise walked the opposite side of the road. Wed then walk up to the trash piles to visually inspect the area for signs of an I.E.D. It became a routine part of our job,but at the same time it was completely insane part of my mind couldnt help contemplating the gravity of what I might be walking into.
In the summer of 2004,we were called up to cordon off a Mosul neighborhood where a roadside bomb had been planted. Helicopters circled overhead. Snipers positioned on the rooftops. Vehicle and foot traffic was barred from the area. Like the curious Iraqis who peered from their balconies to see what the Americans would do next,I turned to watch an soldier from an E.O.D. (Explosive Ordnance Disposal) unit walk out toward the bomb,donned in a thick moonsuit. He was tethered with a white cord from which another soldier unspooled him closer and closer to the I.E.D. This was perhaps the bravest thing I ever saw someone do in Iraq.
There was something in the soundtrack of The Hurt Locker,near the very end of the film,that evoked the Western. And when our main character (Staff Sgt. William James,played by Jeremy Renner) walks back into Iraq,back into the hurt locker of the war,away from the camera and toward the vanishing point on the horizon,I perceived echoes of Shane,the gunslinger hero who rides into the sunset,solo,wounded,into a place beyond the audience,beyond comprehension.
The gunslinger and the horizon. Part of me thinks it reinforces the romantic ideal of the hero thats been handed down to us in the storytelling vein for centuries now. Its connected to the idea that there is glory in war,which I find more than troubling. On the other hand,if we see in that final scene a soldier walking back toward the bomb,to confront the addiction to adrenaline,or the fear,or the confusing and charged emotions that overtake humans in war well,thats intriguing.
The last image of The Hurt Locker expresses a theme Ive often tried to articulate. In the film,the main character cannot completely return to America,to the norm of a life back home. In a sense,hes in Iraq whether hes physically in a supermarket in the States,or in a bomb suit walking into the hurt locker.
That image rings true to me,but Id take it a step further: Id say that we,as a nation,now contain this explosive ordnance within us. Within our national psyche. We have generations of combat veterans and military family members woven throughout the fabric of our entire culture. Some of us have to walk down those dusty streets. We have to approach that which might tear us apart. We have to try to defuse what is explosive within.
The writer,an award-winning poet,served seven years in
the US Army
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