A MIDNIGHT CLEAR
A film review by Mark R. Leeper
Copyright 1992 Mark R. Leeper
Capsule review: Black comedy and tragedy about a German
and an American squad who want to make a separate peace
during the Battle of the Bulge. The film tries to emulate
Heller's CATCH-22 and black comedies such as CASTLE KEEP.
Rating: low +2 (-4 to +4).
A MIDNIGHT CLEAR is a World War II story on the insanity and stupidity of war in general told with bitter humor and irony. It begs comparison with CASTLE KEEP and especially CATCH-22 It pretty well had to be an angry film, being directed by Keith Gordon (who had previously made THE CHOCOLATE WAR), and being based on a novel by William Wharton (the author of the book BIRDY). And there is a lot of rage let out in A MIDNIGHT CLEAR, sometimes eloquently, sometimes muddled.
The story is set in mid-December, 1944, in the Ardennes Forest. Somewhere, in another part of the forest, the Battle of the Bulge--the last great German offensive of the war--is raging. (Curiously, they never mention that this is the Battle of the Bulge, even in the narration. It might have helped some viewers place the action in perspective.) The story concerns a squad of six very war-weary Americans sent to act as sentinels where the Germans are expected to break through. Basically they are to report, then save themselves if they can. It does not help their odds that one of their number is already nearly insane. No reasonable commander would give such an order, but their Major Griffin (played by John McGinley) is every soldier's worst nightmare--stupid, officious, and without a touch of sympathy for the men he commands.
Then things start getting stranger for the squad. They find the corpses of a German and an American soldier frozen in a tableau of dancing together. They have several encounters with Germans that should have gotten them killed and the Germans refuse to throw anything at them worse than snowballs. In fact, they have run into a squad of Germans who apparently wants to play one of the most dangerous games of wartime--they seem to want to make a separate peace.
This is a slow, deliberate, and very introspective film--an odd choice to start the summer fluff season. It reaches its climax a good half-hour before the end of the film and then just sort of smolders out. There are many bizarre touches in the photography, not the least of which is the bizarre statuary in the area the squad is trying to secure. One statue holds its decapitated head in front of it like a ghost. Mark Isham's score depicts the weirdness of the situation, but certainly not the period. The film is sad, angry, and anti-war straight through. Even the flashback sex scene turns out to be sad, angry, and anti-war. The film is much more anxious to attain a literary style than to be an accurate portrayal of how war is fought, but it makes its point. I give it a low +2 on the -4 to +4 scale.
Mark R. Leeper
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