Soldier
I just saw the English movie, Soldier, after a long time. I used to watch this movie every time it used to come around 5 years ago. It seemed to convey to me my own life story, the beginning, the present torture, and the victorious future. A fearful training as soldiers, tortured when they showed any emotions. A ruthless competition held to recruit the best, and dump the ‘obsolete’ on the dumping planet. Kurt Russell was replaced and dumped there, injured, where the surviving human community took care of him. He saved one of the men’s lives there. But he showed no emotions, no sign of happiness, not even a slight smile; a completely blank face. No pain when he cut his finger with a knife, and when asked how it felt like to be a soldier, the words seemed to come out of my own mouth, “Fear. Fear in discipline.”
“Even now?”
“Every day, sir.”
The emotions that he encountered were those of fear and anger, which he suppressed by punching a makeshift aluminum bag.
Later, when the same captain who dumped him as obsolete, commanded his ship to build a base on the dumping planet, and wipe out all inhabitants as potentially hostile, Kurt was the one who would save them. He gathered all the weapons and started ‘filling them up’. When asked how he knew that the retreating soldiers would come back, his answer shot back in my mind like the words of Bourne, my own true self, “I know… ”. And consequently, what he would do alone against those military forces, his words echoed in my mind like Metallica’s song, “Kill’em All”. His own military teammates saluted him as he reached their ship with the women and children, after wiping out the entire army, and helped him abandon the corrupt superiors and take off.
“Hail thy Savior!”
Posted by puzli at July 3, 2005 11:53 AM
