Media Meditation III: Miracle at St. Anna

I watched a movie a few weeks back called Miracle at St. Anna. It was about a black group of soldiers in WWII. It was a great movie in an overdone genre.



There have been countless Saving Private Ryan knockoffs since the movie first came out, most of which crash and burn for being a lame excuse of a war movie. But Miracle at St. Anna was different. It was like a breath of fresh air in a giant pit of garbage.

This movie is about four black soldiers in WWII who get stuck in a village in Italy after their company was attacked. They develop relationships with the villagers while trying to keep from killing each other. There is everything a war movie should have, from great action, to excellent character development to that final battle scene in every single war movie that has ever existed.

It was also definitely refreshing to see black soldiers being the focus of a movie, instead of the typical white battalions that are portrayed in the other war movies. Even if it wasn't perfectly historically accurate, it makes the movie stand out from your run of the mill WWII movie, which was quite nice. The movie also focused more on the characters and their predicament and how they dealt with it, rather than just senseless battle scene after battle scene of American soldiers slaughtering Nazis.

This movie made you think a bit, which really focused on the limbic and neocortex brains, but it also had its fair share of good action scenes which made your reptilian brain scream out in awe and wonder. The three together fit perfectly for this movie, just increasing its value of a movie.

This movie was a great movie. You really get attached to the characters, which is always a plus in my book. The action scenes are excellently done, giving it another wow factor. Pretty much all aspects of this movie were well done, from the acting to the directing to the writing. An excellent movie that stands out among a very, very large genre.