LITTLE DIETER NEEDS TO GET HOME
RESCUE DAWN

Directed by Werner Herzog; written by Werner Herzog; cinematography by Peter Zeitlinger; editing by Joe Bini; original music by Klaus Badelt; art direction by Arin ‘Aoi’ Pinijvararak; set decoration by Peter Mayer; costume design by Annie Dunn

With: Christian Bale, Steve Zahn, Jeremy Davies, Zach Grenier, Abhijati ‘Meuk’Jusakul, Lek Chaiyan Chunsuttiwat, Galen Yuen, and Marshall Bell. Rated PG-13. Running time: 126 minutes

Reviewed by Joel Johnson

Rescue Dawn is a film set in the early years of American involvement in the Vietnam War. We are now bombarded daily with references to the Vietnam War. Those who oppose the current involvement in Iraq cite the similarities to the quagmire of Vietnam that consumed nearly 60,000 American lives, a huge chunk of change, and American unity. Those favoring the president’s “stay-the-course” or “surge” strategy point out the similarities to Vietnam in revealing our weakness, emboldening our enemies, and undermining our stature in the world. There are, of course, similarities and differences between Vietnam and Iraq. And what exactly are the lessons that we Americans should have drawn from our Vietnam experiences? While this is a critical question for Americans, you will certainly need to look to someone else other than me and likewise to other films to find the answers to that question. Rescue Dawn is a film about one individual’s personal story that just happens to have happened in Vietnam. While there may be insight to be drawn from this, it is there to be extracted by the filmgoer. The filmmaker has refrained from shaping a political message and force-feeding it to the audience. In these times of volatile political diatribes and rhetoric, that-to me-is highly refreshing.

Many critics have pondered why the director has even bothered to make this film. The main character is Dieter Dengler (Christian Bale) whose life was the subject of a documentary film by Warner Herzog called Little Dieter Needs to Fly (1997). While it is a fair question to ask, it is not a question that audiences need to spend much time on. The answer may be quite simple. I do not know that I have ever had an opportunity to see Little Dieter either at a film festival or at a local theater. Rescue Dawn, though not booked into every multiplex, did come to a theater near me. Though documentaries have made headway in the marketplace, fictional films still rule there and can reach so many more people. However, it is highly recommended that Little Dieter Needs to Fly be sought out and watched as a companion piece to Rescue Dawn.

Christian Bale delivers another stellar performance that should be considered during the upcoming award season. It seems like Bale has been making films forever. He was still a boy when he first gained prominence from Stephen Spielberg’s Empire of the Sun. That was twenty years and thirty-five films ago-including a couple yet to be completed per the Internet Movie Database. He has been busy, and he is still only thirty-three. Though he has collected a number of nominations and prizes for his performances, he has yet to be noticed by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. Sooner or later it is going to happen because he delivers far too many exceptional performances to be overlooked forever. This is a film, like The Machinist, that required a remarkable physical transformation of Bale from robust health to serious malnourishment. However, in Rescue Dawn this is a journey undertaken not by Bale alone but by Bale’s costars as well.

When the film begins, Dengler is aboard the aircraft carrier USS Ranger, preparing for his first mission by watching a jungle survival training film. The pilot audience is less than enraptured by the film’s advice. The mission is a covert operation. It involves disrupting traffic on the Ho Chi Minh trail by bombing Laos, an officially neutral country. The eager young Dengler is shot down and crashes in Laos. After eluding the Pathet Lao (Laotian Communist insurgency) guerrillas for a couple days, Dengler is apprehended. Given a denunciation of American imperialism to sign that supposedly would allow him to be released in a couple weeks’ time, Dengler refuses to sign the statement condemning his adoptive country. (His family immigrated to the United States from Germany after World War II.) He refuses, telling his captor, “I love America. America gave me wings.” His captors torture him, tying an ant nest to his face. He is also tied up and dragged on the ground through a village and then tossed down a shallow well, where he nearly drowns. This all happens before he reaches the prisoner of war camp. There he encounters fellow pilots Duane (Steve Zahn) and Gene (Jeremy Davis) as well as a trio of Asians who have worked with the Americans. Dengler is eager to escape and approaches this task with an almost single-minded fervor. His new mates are much more dubious about escape. Gene has signed the denunciation statement and keeps expecting that he will be released within the next two weeks, even though his state of emaciation confirms that he has been in captivity more than two years. Duane chides Dieter, “Don’t you get it? The jungle is the prison.” Escape from the camp will be easy compared to making it back through the jungle to American lines. Still, Dengler perseveres, finding ways to overcome each obstacle. It soon becomes clear as the food supply dwindles that the captors are desperately trying to figure out how to deal with the burden of their captives.

The desperate circumstances of war bring out the best and the worst of humanity. Bravery, sacrifice, compassion, cruelty, and violence are all on display in this film-indeed within the single character Dieter Dengler. The film is both a rip-roaring adventure in the tradition of The Great Escape and a broad stroke character study of another of Herzog’s protagonists with fanatical determination (Klaus Kinski in Aguirre: Wrath of God and Fitzcarraldo, and Grizzly Man documentary subject Timothy Treadwell). This is, of course, what makes watching the documentary Little Dieter Needs to Fly so interesting. How close have Bale, Herzog, and company come in their portrayal of this real human being? So often we don’t have the opportunity to see the film characterization and the genuine article.

Herzog has crafted a fascinating film and received top-drawer performances from Christian Bale and Steve Zahn. Jeremy Davies’s performance as the fearful Gene is all tics and mumbling just short of full regression to the fetal position. It is both maddening and brilliant. The film is straightforward, yet it always hints at something more just beneath the surface. Exactly what that is is up to the filmgoer.