Far from a “Miracle”

The name, Miracle at St. Anna, brings to mind divine intervention, the hand of God coming down to correct all the wrongs, and the romantic sense of connection with the divine. But basically, you expect a miracle. And when you leave the theater not knowing what the miracle was, something definitely went wrong.
At first, the story seems like a historical mystery, and if you’ve seen any of the previews you’ve seen the first fifteen minutes of the movie. A black veteran of World War II, played by Las Alonso shoots an elderly man for apparently no reason, and when the cops search his apartment they find a centuries old statue head that’s worth at least five million dollars. Thus a flashback story unfolds, which draws the viewer in with such expectation that it is only fitting that it ended with disappointment.
After Las Alonso gets arrested, he talks to a reporter, played by Joseph Gordon-Levitt of Third Rock From the Sun, and utters the cryptic words, ‘I know who the sleeping man is.’ We are then thrown into a battle on the Italian Front in World War II where a division of Buffalo Soldiers fight valiantly despite inept white command. Four soldiers are caught behind enemy lines, named Stamp (played by Derek Luke), Bishop (Michael Ealy), Hector (Las Alonso), and Train (Omar Benson Miller). They find a young wounded boy in the middle of a battle and decide to get him to help before they get back to the rest of the army, while Train becomes his surrogate father. They then stumble upon village where they try to find help, and luckily the first place they look the find a woman who can speak english whose name is Renata (played by Valentina Cervi). As the boy seems to be suffering from a mental illness, which is painfully mistook for demonic possession, the four soldiers find a new home in the Italian village where they find no prejudice despite their skin. There is the inevitable love triangle between Renata, Stamp and Bishop, and even more inept white leadership.

Unfortunately, all good things come to a close. A group of Italian freedom fighters, led by a man nicknamed ‘The Great Butterfly’ and accompanied by a man who looked mysteriously like the elderly man Las Alonso shot in the beginning. Soon, everything begins to fall apart, with massive betrayals and, yes, more inept white leadership, and the Nazis coming to town. The four soldiers fight bravely in a last stand a la Saving Private Ryan, but with less epic-ness and more deaths.

You might have realized that I have neglected to mention four seemingly important elements.

1. the statue head that piqued your interest to begin with.
2. what happened at St. Anna.
3. who the ‘sleeping man’ is.
4. a miracle.

Well, if you have, then congratulations. You have thought about the story of this movie more than Spike Lee did when he created it. And there is a reason why I had nothing to say about anything about those points, and that is because they had nothing to do with the story at all. The only significance of the statue head was that it arbitrarily brought closure, the event at St. Anna (which historically was a massacre in Italy where Nazi SS men slaughtered hundreds of Italian civilians) was never even brought to the attention of the main characters, the identity of the ‘sleeping man’ was revealed without enough time left for it to make a difference in the story at all, and at the end of the movie, it is implied that the miracle is that there was no miracle.

Those were the major points of annoyance. The smaller stuff was both irksome and perplexing. For instance, anyone who knows the Second Vatican Council from the Superbowl would know that in 1944 prayers led by Roman Catholic priests would be spoken in Latin, but in one of the most emotional parts of the film an ‘Our Father’ was spoken in Italian. This might not bother most people, but those who value historical accuracy in historical movies would find this reprehensible. For another instance, a black character who, in the beginning of the film, was portrayed as the highest ranking black man you could trust, suddenly turned into a veritable Uncle Tom. In another instance, John Turturro (‘da Jesus’ from The Big Lebowski) and John Leguizamo (‘Toulouse’ from Moulin Rouge!) were introduced early in the film, and usually actors of their caliber get more that a minute on screen.’ It’s frustrating when you realize, at the end, that their parts where inconsequential to the story and the time they wasted on the set for this movie could have been spent making a good one. Their parts could hardly qualify as a cameo.

I don’t want to knock this film’s good parts. It shed light on the Buffalo Soldiers during World War II in a way that has never been done before, racial inequality was handled with a totally blatant stroke that only Spike Lee could do, and it’s gritty realism was beautifully filmed. But you can’t make a film meant to accurately portray Black Americans in World War II, call it Miracle at St. Anna, then completely skimp out on a relevant supernatural religious event. The only lesson learned is you either make Saving Private Ryan for Buffalo Soldiers, or make The Green Mile of war movies, because apparently the middle ground doesn’t exist.

In closing, if you have already seen this movie, don’t worry, the plot was muddy and confusing. If you haven’t and are trying to find out if you should spend ten bucks, don’t.