John Megna | Through the Shattered Lens

One of the best films ever made about Vietnam is also one of the least known.

Go Tell The Spartans takes place in 1964, during the early days of the Vietnam War. Though the Americans at home may not know just how hopeless the situation is in South Vietnam, Major Barker (Burt Lancaster, in one of his best performances) does. Barker is a career military man. He served in World War II and Korea and now he’s ending his career in Vietnam, taking orders from younger superiors who have no idea what they are talking about. Barker has been ordered to occupy a deserted village, Muc Wa. Barker knows that occupying Muc Wa will not make any difference but he is in the army and he follows orders.

Barker sends a small group to Muc Wa. Led by the incompetent Lt. Hamilton (Joe Unger), the group also includes a drug-addicted medic (Dennis Howard), a sadistic South Vietnamese interrogator (Evan C. Kim) who claims that every civilian that the men meet is actually VC, a sergeant (Jonathan Goldsmith) who is so burned out that he would rather commit suicide than take command, and Cpl. Courcey (Craig Wasson). Courcey is a college-educated idealist, who joined the army to do the right thing and is now about to discover how complicated that can be in South Vietnam. At Muc Wa, the soldiers find a cemetery containing the graves of French soldiers who died defending the hamlet during the First Indochina War. The inscription as the cemetery reads, “Go tell the Spartans, stranger passing by, that here, obedient to their laws, we lie.”

Because the film strives for realism over easy drama, Go Tell The Spartans has never gotten the same attention as some other Vietnam films. Unlike The Deer Hunter, Platoon, Coming Home, and Born on the 4th of July, Go Tell The Spartans received no Oscar nominations. It is still a brilliantly acted and powerful anti-war (but never anti-soldier) film. It starts out as deceptively low-key but the tension quickly builds as the soldier arrive at Muc Wa and discover that their orders are both futile and impossible to carry out. Vastly outnumbered, the Americans also find themselves dealing with a land and a culture that is so unlike their own that they are often not even sure who they are fighting. Military discipline, as represented by Lt. Hamilton, is no match for the guerilla tactics of the VC. By the film’s end, Vietnam is revealed to be a war that not even Burt Lancaster can win.

So, I guess I should explain why I’m including the classic 1962 film (and best picture nominee), To Kill A Mockingbird, in this series of reviews of films about politicians. After all, while To Kill A Mockingbird dealt with the issue of racism in Alabama in a surprisingly honest manner, it doesn’t feature any elected officials. Nobody shows up playing Gov. Benjamin J. Miller or President Franklin Roosevelt. Instead, this film is about a wise lawyer named Atticus (Gregory Peck), an innocent man named Tom (Brock Peters), a girl named Scout (Mary Badham) and her older brother Jem (Philip Alford), and a mysterious recluse named Boo (Robert Duvall).

However, if you’ve read Harper Lee’s wonderful novel, then you know that Atticus is not just the smartest man in Maycomb, Alabama. He’s also a member of the Alabama state legislature and his political career is a fairly important subplot in the book, with him occasionally having to leave home so he can go down to Montgomery and help to write the budget. (Incidentally, Harper Lee’s father actually was a member of the Alabama House of Representatives.)

In the film, no mention of Atticus being a member of the state legislature is made but I still choose to believe that he was. Because, as played by Gregory Peck, Atticus Finch is exactly the type of man who you would want to think of as serving in government. He’s wise, compassionate, and firm. For much of To Kill A Mockingbird, he is literally the only sane adult in Maycomb. He’s the only attorney willing to defend Tom Robinson when Tom is accused of raping a white girl. When a mob shows up to lynch Tom, Atticus is the only adult willing to stand up to them. (Fortunately, Jem also runs up and shames the mob by reminding them that she goes to school with their children.) And, in court, it is Atticus who proves that Tom is innocent.

When Tom is still convicted, what makes it all the more devastating is that wise and compassionate Atticus doesn’t seem to be surprised as all. If even Atticus feels that there is no hope for a black man to get a fair trial from an all-white jury, the film seems to be saying, then there truly is no hope.

Of course, the film is not just about Atticus. It’s about Scout and Jem and their friend Dill (John Megna) and how the three of them grow up and learn the truth about their world. Watching them from behind the closed doors of his house is the mysterious and reclusive Boo Radley. When Boo shows up towards the end of the film, I always find tears in my mismatched eyes. Boo is played, in his film debut, by Robert Duvall. Duvall doesn’t say a word but he still makes an incredible impression as the shy and withdrawn Boo.

So, I may be cheating a lot by including To Kill A Mockingbird in this series of reviews. Oh well. Who am I to turn down a chance to rewatch it? To Kill A Mockingbird is just a great film.