Reel War Project

This week Charles and Aaron look back at Batch Thirteen and talk about the evolution of “boat action” on screen. Who is in charge, how do they feel watching the young boys and men die under their command, and why does Master and Commander feel like a step backwards (in spite of the fact that we LOVE the movie)? It’s all here.

This week Charles and Aaron enlist with Kirk and Co. and take to the stars. We talk more about leadership as well as delving into re-militarizing a non-military brand, the struggle to liberate the science fiction imaginary, and the music of James Horner.

Chales and Aaron are back on the barky, this time with Gregory Peck pacing the quarter deck and a quarter of a million dollars in miniatures getting blown to smithereens. How do you produce sound after an era of silent films? How do you import Gregory Peck without violating British economic policy? How do you say "Horatio Hornblower" and keep a straight face? We don't have all the answers, but we DO have GREGORY PECK.

Charles and Aaron board the Surprise to talk about the neomacho, striping books of criticism for the sake of a simple story, and we revisit our conversation about child soldiers. “For England, for home, and for the prize!”

Charles and Aaron look back on the first batch of films for Season 2. They talk Patton (1970), The Admiral: Roaring Currents (2014), and Twelve O'Clock High (1949). Leadership in the air, on land, and at sea, death armies and impossible odds; don’t hold out hope for a trip home; because as we have said all batch: you are already dead.

Charles and Aaron lose their minds over turtle ships and talk about the most watched movie in Korean history. Impossible odds, death armies, and patriotism on screen; did we mention that you are already dead? Because you are already dead.

This week Charles and Aaron take to the skies with Gregory Peck. We make hard choices and then face the consequences…with a nap.

Flashbacks, leadership, and the line between sanity and insanity, don’t feel sad about it, because you are already dead.

“Americans traditionally, love to fight. All real Americans love the sting of battle. Americans play to win all the time.”

Season Two of The Reel War Project kicks off with 1970’s Patton. Charles and Aaron talk about a movie that celebrates as it criticizes, with additional looks at Nazi apologetics, Jacksonian militarism, and the soldier that never dies. Ten-hut!

In this very special episode of the Reel War Project, Charles and Aaron look back on season one and bestow honors on the best and worst film, soldier, music, and more. The barb wire is twinkling and the privates are strewn for the affair - don't miss the Reel aWARds Show!

This week on Reel War Project's Dirt Maps: Dr. Lorenzo Veracini describes key differences between colonialism and settler colonialism, the roles of cinema in sustaining and re-enacting each, and the importance of alienhood in all that follows.

This week on Reel War Project's Dirt Maps Aaron and Charles talk with Andy Rakich from Atun-Shei Films on the importance of tone in storytelling about war.

This week on Reel War Project's Dirt Maps Aaron chats with Dr. Joseph Darda about his new book: How White Men Won The Culture Wars: A History of Veteran America. From grand military reunions to Stallone’s movies and Springsteen’s music, who we remember as “Our Veterans” will matter!

This week on Reel War Project's Dirt Maps Aaron interviews Dr. Scott Murphy from the University of Kansas about the music of Ken Burns’ Vietnam War documentary and heroic structures from the 1850’s found in James Bond, 1917, and The Avengers.

This week on Reel War Project's Dirt Maps we talk to Raya Morag from Hebrew University about her work on Defeated Masculinity and Perpetrator Cinema. We talk about film’s power to repress accountability and yet prompt ethical reflections in viewers. “Hey there. Hi there! Ho there! You’re as welcome as can be!”

This week on Reel War Project's Dirt Maps Charles, Aaron and Eli talk to Dr. Walter Metz from Southern Illinois University about our batches and his perspectives on film criticism.

This week Charles and Aaron record their final episode of Season One, looking back at the batch on Normandy. We discuss a "classic epic", a "thoughtful critique", and a "roller coaster ride with zombies." The book would be "Grover Gets Killed at The End of This Book," he would get into a Higgins boat, and then we turn the page. Thanks for listening to Season One of Reel War!

In this episode of Reel War Project: Dirt Maps Aaron talks to Alyssa “Ember” Smith about her paper comparing legacies of white washing and blackwashing. We talk about cinema and priming, the politics of representation, and the importance of anti-racism in climates of white supremacy.

This week on Reel War Project Charlie and Aaron watch the 33rd and final movie of the season: Overlord (2018). We talk about blackwashing and whitewashing; the sharing of technology between cinema and games; and once again we explore horror as a platform for war culture. It’s gross.

This week on Reel War Project Charlie and Aaron continue Batch 11 on Normandy with 1975's Overlord. We talk about "The Falling Soldier" photo, using war footage with horror tropes to resist war, moving bodies (until there is nothing left at all), and how we don't know where we are going until we are there. If you want a moving and critical war film you have to check this one out. Watch the movie FIRST, then tune in!

This week on Reel War Project Charles and Aaron take The Big Step Off into the last batch of the season, starting with The Longest Day. Avengers vibes, officer movies, epic shots that stand the test of time, and the power of the lies of faction - get into the Higgins boat and puff up the bagpipes because it's time to go ashore.

This week on Reel War Project Charles and Aaron wrap up Batch 10: A Crew of Specialists. We talk about the small squad archetype, violence with stakes, and alienhood rhetoric.

This week on Reel War Project’s Dirt Maps episode four: Trek and Militarim: Dr. Amanda Taylor talks about her research into the martial body and the domestication of war, and then we talk Star Trek and pacifism.

Charles and Aaron wrap up Batch 10 with Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home. We talk about nonviolence in the aesthetic of empire, a long standing effort to speak to diversity from the standpoint of power, horny dolphins, and making a blockbuster war movie that never goes to war.

This week Charles and Aaron watch Bruce Willis connect Jacksonian Militarism to Global Meliorism while Tom Skerritt shouts into a phone on a very busy flight deck: we watched 2003's Tears of the Sun. Afro Pessimism meets the white savior industrial complex bent on "raising awareness," what we get is lots of shooting, awesome displays of power, "true stories" that never happened, and a spectacle of immolation. "I DON'T LIKE THIS."

This week on Reel War Project Charles and Aaron kick off Batch 10 with 1961's The Guns of Navarone. We continue our discussions about photo-tourism and cinematography and what happens when a book becomes a movie. We also return to Star Wars cultures and movie music influencing sports. Bigger characters, valorized individuals, music for war and football games, all while we Zillow shop for our next military campaign locale against the backdrop of the proto-Death Star.

This week on Reel War Project Charles and Aaron discuss Batch Nine: Taking Sides wherein doing nothing is doing something and we have things to say about it.

We talk about the stupid choices America makes regarding war narratives in movies, storytelling and problems with no clear solutions, and Owen Wilson sliding on ice with the loudest pistol you have ever heard.

This week on Reel War Project Charles and Aaron accidentally invent propaganda (twice); meanwhile, Owen Wilson takes a million dollar joyride at the expense of the US taxpayer.

Jacksonian Militarism, angelic American exceptionalism and more sequels nobody wanted, we watched Behind Enemy Lines.

This week Charles and Aaron continue Batch 9. We explore media re-presentation and accountability via the lenses of objectivity and tourism, and the need to "do something" in the face of atrocity. Don't Worry, Be Happy, it's "Welcome to Sarajevo."

This week Reel War Project Charles and Aaron kick off Batch 9 with one of the most interesting movies yet: Before The Rain (1994). We talk about "quivering otherness," (non)legitimizing representations of violence, and we continue our discussion on the legacies of pacifism. The circle is NOT round, it is a paradox!

This week on Reel War Project Charles and Aaron discuss Batch 8: Boiling Points. Stories that (try to) resist violence; the “inevitability” of war; digital black-face and white positionality; it’s getting Critical, and we are here for it.

This week on Reel War Project Charles and Aaron discuss another iconic franchise: Dawn of the Planet of the Apes. We explore reluctant warriors, settler narratives of atavism, and digital blackface. Come for the apes, stay for the pacifism…and BEAR SCARES.

This week on Reel War Project Charles and Aaron continue their conversation about non-violence via 2002’s Bloody Sunday. Messaging and counter messaging, confrontation and escalation, paratroopers stymied by a wall and a ditch. “Yesterday we dared to fight, today we dare to WIN.”

This week on Reel War Project Charles and Aaron talk about pacifism in a war movie via John Sayles’ “Matewan.” Organizing! Folk tunes! Scabs! Poverty by design meets anti-violence activism; STAND UP (FRIENDS!) LET THE BOSSES KNOW.

This week on Reel War Project Charles, Aaron Eli discuss Batch 7: The Spectacle of Slaughter. Does adding blood make a war movie more critical? Is having a cis-het-white-settler-soldier-hero enough to make an anti-war movie a kind of apologetic? What is the deal with bullets plinking into trays?

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This week on Reel War Project Charles, Aaron Eli discuss Michael Bay’s 13 Hours: The Secret Soldier of Benghazi. Anti-state patriotism as almost parody; is every bearded, muscled white guy wearing Oakley’s and carrying a gun just an American flag trying to get out? The answer, obviously, is MORE GUNS.

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This week on Reel War Project Charles, Aaron Eli, our guest Biggs from Not Safe for Network discuss Netflix’s 2015 movie Siege of Jadotville. We talk about anti-US neoliberalism, non-aggressor war stories as imperial aesthetic, and making tropey movies as a small studio like Netflix. Oh! And door sounds.

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This week on Reel War Project Charles, Aaron and Eli kick off Batch 7 with a discussion of 1964’s Zulu. We explore the setter-white gaze, annoying pacifists, singing soldiers, and apologetic war story-telling (here’s a hint, don’t name the movie after the defeat). Oh, and SABATON.

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This week in Batch 6 Episode 4: “Apocalypse How” Aaron and Charles re-visit batch 4 on borrowing war tropes, comparing Star Wars to Jarhead; we talk about the difference between being visible and being looked at; and we explore the thematic tensions between humanity and violence in Vietnam war cinema.

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On the third episode of Dirt Maps Aaron interviews Dr. Amanda Dawson about her article describing "performing imperialism" the "camera gun," and the intersections of storytelling, mediums like film and theater, and our notions of veterans and war.

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This week on Reel War Project Charles and Aaron talk about 2005's Jarhead. Textual winking in music, recruiting and then denying expectations, defeated masculinity, sequels nobody thought possible, "this is not Rambo time"!

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In the second episode of Dirt Maps for Reel War Project, Aaron and Biggs from A Cosmic Void discuss the meaning of the title Full Metal Jacket. Asylum vibes, the monstrification of insanity, institutional madness as a weapon of war, "Hey there! Hi there! Ho there! You're as welcome as can be!"

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This week on Reel War Project Charles and Aaron look at 1987’s iconic Full Metal Jacket. They talk about Post Traumatic Cinema, Hero Trauma Myths and the limits of parody. “Is that you John Wayne? Is this me?” “WHO SAID THAT!?!?!”

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This week on the first ever Dirt Maps, Aaron sits down with Dr. Naomi Toth to discuss her article comparing portrayals of Kurtz ‘Exceptional Men from Conrad to Coppola’. Heart of Darkness! Apocalypse Now! The language of exeptionalism as criticism. “The horror!”!

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This week Charles, Aaron and Eli talk about the banality of evil, performing imperialism, and the camera gun: “don’t look at the camera, this is for television!!”, it’s 1979’s Apocalypse Now.

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This week Charles, Aaron and Eli discuss Batch 5: Children of War. We review Afropessimism, White Exceptionalism, sound politics, and the limits/potentials of bloodless/bloody anti-war movies. Do you have a Little Milius Dude inside you?

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This week on Reel War Project Charles, Aaron and Eli extend their discussion on child soldiers by talking about triumphant war gothic, white settler exceptionalism, and the cola wars: it's "soda" not "pop!" Avenge me! We watched Red Dawn (1984)!

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This week on Reel War Project Charles, Aaron and Eli discuss 2015's Beasts of No Nation. Afro-Pessimism, White Exceptionalism, Child Soldiers, Positional story telling (and all associated cop-outs): what more could you want in a war podcast?

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This week on the Reel War Project Charles, Aaron and Eli discuss the 1959 German film The Bridge. We talk about children soldiers, boyhood, off-camera war, Ur fascism and fascist apologetic.

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This week on Reel War Project Charles, Aaron, and Eli talk about Batch 4: Star Wars Cultures. Music and affect, the triumph of death vs the rejection of cruelty, and the individual masculine capability to enact spectacles of slaughter-Boffin-style! Use the force, baby!

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This week on Reel War Project Charles, Aaron, and Eli talk about arguably the most important American War film of all time - 1977’s Star Wars: A New Hope. Bask in the afterglow of planetary destruction as we discuss sound politics, better AND worse standpoint, and cotton candy war culture.

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