Confusing cuts, length hinder great story

When Spike Lee publicly chastised Clint Eastwood for failing to include a single African-American face in his Iwo Jima epic, “Flags of Our Fathers,” and Eastwood told Lee, in effect, to “shut his face,” Lee did not stoop to responding in kind.

Instead, he did the right thing — he made his own World War II epic to drive home the point that plenty of black Americans fought for their country in that conflict.

Sprawling over more than 2½ hours, “Miracle at St. Anna” features a huge cast, numerous narrative switchbacks and tangents, lots of scenes with German and Italian subtitles and a mesmerizing cameo by Axis Sally (Alexandra Maria Lara).

There’s just one problem: The story, adapted from James McBride’s 2002 novel, is not epic in scale or scope; rather, it’s a tightly drawn character study that Lee strains, mightily but ineffectively, to pump up to something more.

The story focuses on four black “Buffalo Soldiers” of the 92nd Infantry Division, which went up against the Germans in Italy’s Tuscany region in 1944. The four are separated from their unit while crossing a river when their idiot white captain mucks up a fire support mission and rains artillery down on his own troops.

They are the stoic Stamps (Derek Luke), the senior soldier; Bishop (Michael Ealy), a sly, smooth-talking playa from Harlem; the low-key Hector (Laz Alfonso), a black Puerto Rican who knows just enough Italian to converse with the locals; and Train (Omar Benson Miller), a big, sweet-natured teddy bear.

Soon after they’re cut off, Train stumbles upon a traumatized Italian boy (Matteo Sciabordi) hiding alone in a barn. Against the wishes of his comrades, he insists on taking the boy to the relative safety of a nearby town.

Once there, the four become involved with an Italian family that includes grizzled patriarch Ludovico (Omero Antonutti) and his hot ’n’ spicy daughter Renata (Valentina Cervi).

As they try to figure out their next move, they ruminate on the fact that they’re fighting for the very freedom and democracy that they don’t have in their own country; get mixed up with some Italian partisans; and learn more about the boy, who just may be a wee messenger from God (not for nothing is his name Angelo).

All the actors give good performances, especially Miller as the “gigante cioccolato,” willing to go to any lengths to protect his defenseless charge.

And to be sure, the film has its interesting moments. But they’re scattered widely enough that they never gel into a satisfying whole, especially when other issues keep getting in the way.

To start with, a framing story set in 1984 at the front and back ends of the film feels seriously contrived.

Then there are the flashbacks, which fracture the narrative and stall the momentum. Case in point: After we’ve been in Tuscany for an hour, the story jumps back a year to the black soldiers getting a taste of homefront racism while training in Louisiana. Coming when it does, the scene feels misplaced.

But the ultimate off-key note is a scene featuring an atrocity by German troops against Italian civilians — warning: bayonet and baby ahead — that’s as gruesome as it is unnecessary. Is anyone still not clear about who the bad guys were in the Big One?

Unquestionably, Lee’s heart is in the right place, but the fuzzy and disjointed “Miracle at St. Anna” ends up being a film that you want to like much more than you actually do.

Source: Airforcetimes