Other Titles • Flags • Flags of Our Fathers (2006) • Banderas de nuestros padres
Synopses for Flags of Our Fathers (2006)
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Clint Eastwood adapts James Bradley's book FLAGS OF OUR FATHERS for the big screen, presenting a tale of bravery in World War II as six men struggle to raise the flag at the Battle of Iwo Jima.
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From Academy Award®-winning director Clint Eastwood ("Million Dollar Baby," "Unforgiven") comes the World War II drama "Flags of Our Fathers," produced by Eastwood, Academy Award® winner Steven Spielberg ("Saving Private Ryan," "Schindler's List"), and Rob Lorenz ("Mystic River").
February 1945. Even as victory in Europe was finally within reach, the war in the Pacific raged on. One of the most crucial and bloodiest battles of the war was the struggle for the island of Iwo Jima, which culminated with what would become one of the most iconic images in history: five Marines and a Navy corpsman raising the American flag on Mount Suribachi.
The inspiring photo capturing that moment became a symbol of victory to a nation that had grown weary of war and made instant heroes of the six American soldiers at the base of the flag, some of whom would die soon after, never knowing that they had been immortalized. But the surviving flag raisers had no interest in being held up as symbols and did not consider themselves heroes; they wanted only to stay on the front with their brothers in arms who were fighting and dying without fanfare or glory.
"Flags of Our Fathers" is based on the bestselling book by James Bradley with Ron Powers, which chronicled the battle of Iwo Jima and the fates of the flag raisers and some of their brothers in Easy Company. Bradley's father, John "Doc" Bradley, was one of the soldiers pictured raising the flag, although James never knew the full extent of his father's experiences until after the elder Bradley's death in 1994.
The ensemble cast of "Flags of Our Fathers" includes Ryan Phillippe ("Crash"), Jesse Bradford ("Happy Endings"), Adam Beach ("Windtalkers"), Paul Walker ("Into the Blue"), Jamie Bell ("Billy Elliot"), Barry Pepper ("Saving Private Ryan") and John Benjamin Hickey ("Flightplan").
It is the most memorable photograph of World War II, among the greatest pictures ever taken. The winner of the Pulitzer Prize for photography and one of the most-reproduced images in the history of photography, the picture has inspired postage stamps, posters, the covers of countless magazines and newspapers, and even the Marine Corps War Memorial in Arlington, Virginia.
"Raising the Flag on Iwo Jima," a picture taken by Associated Press photographer Joe Rosenthal on February 23, 1945 depicts five Marines and one Navy Corpsman raising the U.S. flag on Mount Suribachi. The image served as a counterpoint for one of the most vicious battles of the war: the fight to take Iwo Jima, a desolate island of black sand barely eight square miles that would prove a tipping point in the Pacific campaign. Lasting more than a month, the fight was a bloody, drawn-out conflict that might have turned the American public against the war entirely, had it not been for the photo, which was taken and published five days into the battle.
The photograph made heroes of the men in the picture as the three surviving flag-raisers were returned to the U.S. and made into props in the government’s Seventh War Bond Tour. Uncomfortable with their new celebrity, the flag-raisers considered the real heroes to be the men who died on Iwo Jima; still, the American public held them up as the best America had to offer, the supermen who conquered the Japanese…
...and then, just as quickly as it had arrived, the glory faded. For two of the surviving flag-raisers, life became a series of compromises and disappointments; for the third, happiness came only by shutting off his war experiences and rarely speaking of them ever again.
"Flags of Our Fathers" is a human drama of friendship and love, sacrifice and manipulation, set against the violent conflict of the battle of Iwo Jima. Two-time Academy Award®-winning director Clint Eastwood focuses equally on the war and home, crosscutting between the viciousness of the battle and the manufactured propaganda campaign and careful manipulation of the image that followed – issues that remain prevalent today. As "Flags of Our Fathers" shows how the photograph became the very beginning of celebrity worship, the film questions our need to create and celebrate heroes, sometimes at a cost.
DreamWorks Pictures and Warner Bros. Pictures present a Malpaso/Amblin Entertainment production, "Flags of Our Fathers." Directed by Clint Eastwood, the screenplay is by William Broyles, Jr. and Paul Haggis, based on the book by James Bradley with Ron Powers. Clint Eastwood, Steven Spielberg, and Robert Lorenz produce the film.
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