movie review of hacksaw ridge

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"Hacksaw Ridge," about a pacifist who won the Medal of Honor without firing a shot, is a mess. It makes hash of its plainly stated moral code by reveling in the same blood-lust it condemns. But it's also one of the few original action movies released in the last decade, and one of the only studio releases this year that could sincerely be described as a religious picture. Of course, it's directed by Mel Gibson , who rose to international stardom in R-rated action flicks and went on to become the true heir to Sam Peckinpah , directing a series of astoundingly violent films with cores of spirituality: " Braveheart ," " The Passion of the Christ " and "Apocalypto." True to form, "Hacksaw Ridge" draws equally on Gibson's bottomless thirst for mayhem and his sincerely held religious beliefs—or some of them, anyway. It's a movie at war with itself.

The first half lays out the childhood and adolescence of its hero, Desmond T. Doss ( Andrew Garfield ), a Seventh-day Adventist turned U.S. Army corporal. Set in Virginia hill country in the '20s and '30s, it's shot in the creamy hues of a Norman Rockwell painting, and filled with earnest, Old Hollywood-styled exchanges about violence and pacifism. The second half is set during the Battle of Okinawa, where Doss, who described himself as a "conscientious collaborator" rather than objector, rescued 75 fellow infantrymen injured by the Japanese; it feels like an attempt to one-up the D-Day sequence in " Saving Private Ryan ," and if sheer bloody explosive nastiness were the only measure, you'd have to declare "Hacksaw Ridge" the winner. The combat pays nearly as much attention to the rending, burning and perforating of flesh as it does to the hero's anguish and ingenuity. Gibson shows soldiers using mortar shells as homemade grenades (as in the climax of "Saving Private Ryan"), shifts into glorious slow-motion to showcase a soldier kicking an enemy's lobbed grenade away, and treats us to the surreal and inappropriately comic sight of Doss towing a paraplegic infantryman on a homemade sled while the man cuts down bushels of Japanese soldiers with a sub-machine gun.

This stuff feels like a violation of the spirit of Doss' moral code, if not its letter. But the first half, which channels the majestic squareness of a John Ford family drama, is weird, too. It's myth-making with a dash of self-help and Scripture, but Gibson keeps trying to jazz things up with violence or the threat of violence, even when the scenes don't seem to call for it. Familiar movie situations, such as Doss taking his future wife Dorothy Schutte ( Teresa Palmer ) out on a date or getting to know his bunk-mates, are interrupted by horror movie-style jump scares or fused to bits of black comic suspense (we know somebody's going to get maimed by the knife that a soldier is brandishing when Doss enters the barracks; the only questions are which one and when). This is the directorial equivalent of Gibson the actor working Three Stooges shtick into otherwise straightforward dialogue scenes—either a nervous tic or a compulsion. The wide shots of corpses piled up, the shots of Doss posed like Christ or lit by heavenly sunlight streaming through windows, and the moments when Doss treats enemy soldiers with compassion, are a lot more on-message.

All that said, "Hacksaw Ridge" seems aware of its inability to present the horrors of war in a consistently non-thrilling, non-cool way. There are even moments where the film seems ashamed that it can't live up to Doss' example—particularly when other characters question Doss' belief that violence is never justified and that there is no real distinction between killing and murder. What you see on other characters' faces in these scenes is not contempt but incredulity, followed by petulance and finally denial. They can feel the truth of what Doss is saying. But they can't imagine the world being anything other than what it is, a place ruled by brute force and cruelty. The rifles that Doss refuses to pick up are described as girls, women, mates, "perhaps the only thing in life you'll truly love." The other soldiers' crude sexual talk and casual sadism are contrasted with Doss' sweetness, piety and chastity. Doss' drill sergeant ( Vince Vaughn , effectively typecast as a charismatic bully) and other commanding officers keep pressuring Doss to pick up a rifle. When he refuses, they humiliate him and sign off on his hazing; his own platoon-mates call him "coward" and "pussy." They don't want to break or kill Doss, just drive him from their sight, perhaps so they won't have to second-guess themselves each time they lay eyes on him.

It's worth pointing out here that Doss is the child of an alcoholic World War I veteran, Tom ( Hugo Weaving ). The film's own contradictions are embodied in Doss' dad. He preaches the virtues of nonviolence, rails against the romanticizing of war, visits the graves of childhood friends killed at the Battle of Belleau Wood , and doesn't want Doss or his older brother Hal ( Nathaniel Buzolic ) to enlist after Pearl Harbor. But he's also self-pitying, quick to anger, and beats his wife Bertha ( Rachel Griffiths ) and their sons. He wants to change and knows why he should. But he can't.

Tom Doss' drinking problem feels like more than just a biographical detail. The script, credited to Andrew Knight and playwright Robert Schenkkan (" All the Way "), keeps returning to Tom. The hero's pacifism seems as much a rejection of his dad's angry brokenness and inability to control his temper as a reaction to almost killing his brother in a childhood scuffle. Also of interest: like Sam Peckinpah, Gibson has struggled with alcoholism , he has bipolar disorder and rage issues as well, and as an artist he is addicted to violence. In its more thoughtful moments, the film treats intoxication with violence, both real and fictional, as a species-wide addiction—one that can't easily be broken. I'd be shocked if a director as attuned to mythic signifiers as Gibson weren't trying, in his own fumbling way, to explore this idea.

Too bad action-film awesomeness is the intoxicant that "Hacksaw Ridge" can't quit. You feel the movie fighting to suppress its urge to glorify violence and treat the Japanese as sinister hordes. Even in non-war scenes, it can't stop reaching for the bottle, and there's a wave of shame when it falls off the wagon. A lingering close-up of guts and goop is followed by a shot of the hero looking appalled or terrified, as if to rebuke the director's gifts.

"Hacksaw Ridge" seems to know that its hero is better than anyone around him, perhaps better than the movie that tells his story. This comes through strongly in the relationship between Doss and fellow infantryman Smitty ( Luke Bracey ), a far more convincing love story than the one between Doss and his gal. Of course Smitty loathes and torments Doss, then comes to respect and even revere him. The way Smitty looks at Doss during the battle of Okinawa recalls the way the disciples gazed upon Jesus in Gibson's "The Passion of the Christ"—as a promise and a mystery; a person so strikingly different from other people, so fully formed, so serenely and undeniably good, that he seems more angel than man. Garfield's performance humanizes him. For a long time you think Doss is an idealized figure, free of neuroses and complications. But after a while you see the darkness in him, and you believe it exists because of the thoughtful way Garfield has prepared you.

This film is inept and beautiful, stupid and amazing. It doesn't have the words or images to express how deep it is. That's why it's more interesting to talk about than it is to watch. I wonder what the real Doss, who died in 2006, would have thought of it.

Matt Zoller Seitz

Matt Zoller Seitz is the Editor at Large of RogerEbert.com, TV critic for New York Magazine and Vulture.com, and a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in criticism.

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Film credits.

Hacksaw Ridge (2016)

Rated R for intense prolonged realistically graphic sequences of war violence including grisly bloody images.

131 minutes

Andrew Garfield as Desmond T. Doss

Teresa Palmer as Dorothy Schuttle

Hugo Weaving as Tom Doss

Vince Vaughn as Sergeant Howell

Sam Worthington as Captain Glover

Rachel Griffiths as Bertha Doss

Matthew Nable as Lt. Cooney

Luke Bracey as Smitty

Andrew Knight
Robert Schenkkan

Cinematographer

Simon Duggan
John Gilbert
Rupert Gregson-Williams

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Review: ‘Hacksaw Ridge’ Has the Guts and the Glory. But Where’s the Gun?

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By A.O. Scott

Nov. 1, 2016

Mel Gibson can be accused of many things, but subtlety is not one of them. Even at his worst — I mean as a filmmaker, not a political thinker — he consistently proves to be an able craftsman and a shrewd showman. “Hacksaw Ridge,” the first feature he has directed since “Apocalypto,” a decade ago, is a bluntly effective faith-and-flag war drama, the true story of a remarkable hero with a knot of moral tension at its center.

That hero, Desmond Doss , is inscribed in the history books as something of a paradox: a conscientious objector who was awarded the Medal of Honor for bravery in combat. A Seventh-day Adventist who refused to carry a gun, Doss served as an Army medic in the Battle of Okinawa. What he did there is easily Googled (and is the subject of Terry L. Benedict’s documentary “The Conscientious Objector”), but I won’t go too far in spoiling a tale that Mr. Gibson retells with vigor and suspense.

And also in graphic and gruesome detail. Mr. Gibson’s appetite for gore is without equal in modern Hollywood. Maybe that’s saying a lot, or maybe it goes without saying, but the man is an aficionado — a connoisseur, an epicure, a gourmand — of exploding heads, shattered limbs and burst abdomens. As he did most famously in “The Passion of the Christ,” he once again plunges a man of peace into a charnel house of cruelty, testing the fortitude of protagonist and audience alike.

“Hacksaw Ridge” opens with a taste of hell, a battleground that belongs more in a horror movie than in a combat picture. Rupert Gregson-Williams’s jarring, minor-key score plays under a slow-motion tableau of spurting blood, splintering bones, burning flesh and general agony.

Then the music changes, the light shifts, and we are in paradise: a hilly, pastoral corner of Virginia years before Pearl Harbor. Young Desmond (Darcy Bryce) and his brother, Hal (Roman Guerriero), chase each other over rocks and streams. Not that they dwell in a perfect Eden. There is a whiff of Cain and Abel in their relationship, and more serious trouble from their father, Tom (Hugo Weaving), a bitter, alcoholic World War I veteran. Though he hates war, the elder Doss is hardly a pacifist, and his violent behavior toward his sons and their mother (Rachel Griffiths) helps push Desmond toward peace-loving piety.

Movie Review: ‘Hacksaw Ridge’

The times critic a. o scott reviews “hacksaw ridge.”.

“Hacksaw Ridge” tells the story of an army medic in the battle of Okinawa who refused to carry a gun. In his review A.O. Scott writes: Mel Gibson can be accused of many things, but subtlety is not one of them. “Hacksaw Ridge” is a bluntly effective faith-and-flag war drama, the true story of a remarkable hero with a knot of moral tension at its center. The film pretends to be a grim reckoning with the horrors of war, but it is also, true to its genre, a rousing celebration of the thrills of battle. Desmond Doss was calm, humble and courageous, qualities Mr. Gibson honors but does not share. It is possible to be moved and inspired by Desmond’s exploits while still feeling that his convictions have been exploited, perhaps even betrayed.

Played as a young man by Andrew Garfield, Desmond is a happy anti-warrior, with a goofy grin and wide, trusting eyes. He courts a nurse named Dorothy (Teresa Palmer), and their romance is so sweet and squeaky clean — he kisses her; she slaps his face; he proposes — that you might think the old production code was still in effect. And until the fighting resumes about halfway through, “Hacksaw Ridge” often feels like a throwback to an earlier era, a work of careful and calculated nostalgia.

When Desmond arrives at basic training, he is introduced to a platoon whose composition — one guy from Brooklyn, another from Texas, a Pole, an Italian, a pretty boy and a hothead — would have looked corny back in the ’40s. And let’s not forget Sarge, a fountain of colorful insults played by Vince Vaughn, who stands out among the mostly Australian and British cast members for his effortlessly flat vowels and the equal effortlessness of his scene-stealing.

Sarge does not much care for Desmond. Neither does his commander, Captain Glover (Sam Worthington). Desmond’s refusal to bear arms strikes these officers as a potential threat to morale, and they try to get rid of him — encouraging the other soldiers to harass and beat him, trying to arrange a psychiatric discharge and finally convening a court-martial. This parade of indignities leads to scenes of quiet defiance; a few rousing, tear-streaked speeches; and a bit of mildly interesting philosophical reflection. Mr. Gibson is too impatient to linger over the nuances of patriotic duty and religious devotion. He and the screenwriters, Robert Schenkkan and Andrew Knight, are content to remind us that both are very important. Then it’s time to get back to Okinawa and deal with the Japanese Army.

Ever since “Saving Private Ryan,” Hollywood has been eager to revisit World War II, partly to explore gray areas and narrative corners neglected in earlier eras and partly to have a high-minded reason to try out advances in bloody special effects. Realism is less a principle than an excuse to concoct vivid fantasies of battle for the benefit of noncombatants, to rub our faces in details that our fathers and grandfathers were famously reluctant to discuss.

And “Hacksaw Ridge” uses the moral dilemma of its hero — who is sometimes tempted to forsake his vows and pick up a rifle in the heat of battle — as a pretext for its own ethical sleight of hand. The film pretends to be a grim reckoning with the horrors of war, but it is also, true to its genre, a rousing celebration of the thrills of battle. Desmond Doss was calm, humble and courageous, qualities Mr. Gibson honors but does not share. It is possible to be moved and inspired by Desmond’s exploits while still feeling that his convictions have been exploited, perhaps even betrayed.

“Hacksaw Ridge” is rated R (Under 17 requires accompanying parent or adult guardian). Blood, guts and period-appropriate racial slurs and tobacco use. Running time: 2 hours 11 minutes.

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Hacksaw ridge, common sense media reviewers.

True story of pacifist soldier has extreme war violence.

A Lot or a Little?

What you will—and won't—find in this movie.

Have integrity, and stick to your convictions. Som

Raised in a religious but violent home, young Doss

Extremely graphic war violence. Men are killed and

Kissing, sometimes passionately. Doss and Dorothy

"S--t," "bitch," "ass,&qu

Doss' father is an abusive alcoholic. Wounded

Positive Messages

Have integrity, and stick to your convictions. Sometimes playing by the rules isn't the best way to do good. If you believe in yourself, it's OK if others don't understand you or even hate you. Courage is a clear theme.

Positive Role Models

Raised in a religious but violent home, young Doss nearly kills his brother with a brick. Later he renounces violence and refuses to even touch a weapon. He feels it's his duty to serve his country in battle as a medic, saving people. He valiantly sticks to his principles when the army tries to court martial him. Fellow soldiers who taunt and beat him later apologize after Doss puts himself in harm's way to save wounded soldiers.

Violence & Scariness

Extremely graphic war violence. Men are killed and maimed, all realistically shown. Soldiers are hacked into pieces by explosions. Warring soldiers hold a live grenade between them and grab onto each other until the grenade explodes, killing them both. Bullets hit soldiers in the head, legs, torsos, and more; lots of blood. Soldiers bayonet each other, and men on both sides are lit on fire (while alive) by flame-throwing weapons. Some slit enemies' throats. Piles of human entrails are seen on the battlefield. A man's foot is impaled with a knife. Rats gnaw at dead bodies. About to be defeated, a Japanese commander eviscerates himself with a knife, after which his head is cut off. Two young brothers fight, punching each other; one hits the other in the head with a large brick. An alcoholic father beats his children and wife and threatens the latter with a gun. Their grown son intervenes and points the gun at his father. A woman slaps a man after he kisses her, demanding he ask her first. A needle is inserted into the arm of a man giving blood. Doss' hands are rubbed raw and bloody from lowering wounded soldiers down the ridge by pulley. During the second battle, Doss kicks a live grenade back at the Japanese.

Did you know you can flag iffy content? Adjust limits for Violence & Scariness in your kid's entertainment guide.

Sex, Romance & Nudity

Kissing, sometimes passionately. Doss and Dorothy prepare to go to bed on their wedding night; she's clothed, he shirtless. Soldiers are advised to "wear a hat" (a condom) if they plan to have sex. Non-sexual nudity includes a soldier doing pull-ups while naked and being forced to run an obstacle course naked by his sergeant (no graphic nudity).

Did you know you can flag iffy content? Adjust limits for Sex, Romance & Nudity in your kid's entertainment guide.

"S--t," "bitch," "ass," "numb nuts," "t-tty," "hell," "damn," "crap," and "Jesus Christ" as an exclamation. American soldiers refer to the Japanese as "Japs" and "Nips."

Did you know you can flag iffy content? Adjust limits for Language in your kid's entertainment guide.

Drinking, Drugs & Smoking

Doss' father is an abusive alcoholic. Wounded soldiers get morphine for their pain. Adults smoke cigarettes.

Did you know you can flag iffy content? Adjust limits for Drinking, Drugs & Smoking in your kid's entertainment guide.

Parents Need to Know

Parents need to know that Hacksaw Ridge is based on the true story of Desmond Doss ( Andrew Garfield ), a pacifist who enlisted in World War II but refused to carry a weapon or kill, preferring to save wounded men as a medic. Director Mel Gibson doesn't shy away from showing extremely graphic war violence. Bullets pierce flesh in slow motion, explosions toss men in the air, bleeding leg and arm stumps are shown, throats are slashed, soldiers bayonet each other to death, and men are graphically gutted, disembodied, and beheaded, with entrails and ligaments left hanging. Doss is also beaten by his fellow soldiers during basic training due to his refusal to carry a weapon. And his superior officers jail and put him on trial. Doss kisses and marries a nurse; they're seen (him shirtless, her clothed) on their wedding night. Doss' father is an abusive alcoholic. Adults smoke cigarettes and use language including: "s--t," "ass," "t--ties," "bitch," and the racist terms "Japs" and "Nips." Ultimately, though the movie's message is one of courage, integrity, and sticking to your convictions. To stay in the loop on more movies like this, you can sign up for weekly Family Movie Night emails .

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Community Reviews

Parents say (42)
Kids say (126)

Based on 42 parent reviews

What's the Story?

HACKSAW RIDGE is based on the true story of Desmond Doss ( Andrew Garfield ), a conscientious objector who was awarded the Medal of Honor for rescuing 75 wounded men while under fire during World War II. Doss was the son of a violent alcoholic father ( Hugo Weaving ) who beat his mother and encouraged violence between his sons. But the devout Doss renounces violence as he comes to believe that the 10 commandments speak directly to him. Because he loves his country, he enlists to serve in World War II, certain he can support the military as an unarmed medic on the battlefield. The Army doesn't agree and spends a great deal of energy trying to rid itself of a man who refuses to touch a weapon, never mind learn to shoot people with it. Eventually, though, a colonel allows Doss to become a medic without completing the weaponry portion of basic training. His company's first mission is to take a strategic, strongly defended Japanese ridge. Once on the battlefield and under relentless attack, Doss and the men he trained with are horrified and overwhelmed by the grisly and terrifying facts of war. But Doss darts from body to body, checking for life and treating the wounded. When his company retreats, Doss seeks prayerful guidance and then returns alone to the battlefield, unarmed, to begin an all-night campaign to save as many men as he can.

Is It Any Good?

Although this WWII action drama is a technical wonder, the soul of the movie feels at odds with itself. While director Mel Gibson fairly represents Doss' pacifist principles, he also simultaneously stages another movie, a stealth movie, that presents war as a glorious character builder, a nurturing ground for male friendship, and an expression of man's nobility and grit. Yes, Gibson dutifully records the severed limbs and the moaning, wounded, hideously disfigured soldiers. War is hell, the movie says over and over again.

But, the director also reminds us, it's not without moments of nobility and magnificence -- as evidence by the gorgeous slow-motion depictions of bombs landing on human targets, bursting into awe-inspiring flames, and killing and maiming who knows how many, just to prove his point (a point he previously made in Braveheart ). So it's hard not to feel like Hacksaw Ridge works as hard to undermine Doss' position as it does to support it. Many of the soldiers and officers who at first abuse and look down on Doss for his refusal to carry a gun later apologize to him after recognizing his bravery and the depth of his convictions. All of that said, Garfield does a great job playing Doss with intelligence, charm, and a believable inner spiritual life.

Talk to Your Kids About ...

Families can talk about Hacksaw Ridge 's violence . How does it compare to what you might see in a superhero action movie or horror movie? Which has the most impact? Why do you think that is?

What does it mean to have a sense of duty? Why do you think Doss felt so strongly about going into battle, unarmed, to help the wounded soldiers?

How does Doss demonstrate integrity and courage ? Why are those important character strengths ?

Talk about how the movie depicts the historic events at its center. How accurate do you think it is? Why might filmmakers choose to alter the facts? What are the challenges of adapting a true story for the screen?

War movies tend to take one side's perspective over the other(s). Why is it important to be aware of that? How might this story be told differently from the Japanese army's point of view?

Movie Details

In theaters : November 4, 2016
On DVD or streaming : February 21, 2017
Cast : Andrew Garfield , Sam Worthington , Teresa Palmer , Hugo Weaving
Director : Mel Gibson
Inclusion Information : Female actors
Studio : Lionsgate
Genre : Drama
Topics : History
Character Strengths : Courage , Integrity
Run time : 138 minutes
MPAA rating : R
MPAA explanation : intense prolonged realistically graphic sequences of war violence including grisly bloody images
Last updated : February 9, 2024

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Hacksaw Ridge Reviews

The superbly shot battle scenes aside, Gibson’s traditionalist sensibilities show up in how he shoots everything else which is a perfect fit for this particular film. It’s easy to get lost in the period he visualizes.

Full Review | Original Score: 4.5/5 | Aug 21, 2022

Hacksaw Ridge seems at odds with itself, particularly during the chaotic and gruesome second half, as it tells a story about a brave pacifist while also satiating the filmmaker's long-demonstrated bloodlust.

Full Review | Original Score: 2.5/4 | Apr 9, 2022

Mel Gibson's direction can hardly be deemed inspired, but because he's less ham-fisted in his jingoistic zeal than Peter Berg, his workmanlike efficiency at least rarely gets in the way of a worthy storyline.

Full Review | Original Score: 3/4 | Nov 13, 2021

Hacksaw Ridge sends us into the trenches, displays what one can achieve with faith, and honors the courageous character of Desmond Doss.

Full Review | Original Score: 3/4 | Feb 3, 2021

Overall, the movie doesn't add up to much.

Full Review | Dec 23, 2020

It's as if Gibson wants to impart a message of peaceful religious convictions while also reenacting grisly, high-octane war moments.

Full Review | Original Score: 7/10 | Dec 4, 2020

Is Gibson glorifying the violence that Doss nearly gave his life to shun? Perhaps.

Full Review | Original Score: 3.5/4.0 | Sep 10, 2020

...fatally and hopelessly flawed...

Full Review | Aug 13, 2020

Hacksaw Ridge has its heart in the right place but gets off to an uneven start and in some respects you could accuse this film as being Oscar bait.

Full Review | Original Score: 3.5/5 | Jul 17, 2020

Mel Gibson is a monster when filming action: he has a gift for directing violence. [Full review in Spanish]

Full Review | Jul 2, 2020

Hacksaw Ridge is about an unbelievable man doing unbelievable things for people who don't like him.

Full Review | Original Score: B+ | Jun 30, 2020

We can say Gibson have returned to the violent historical drama for which his style has been characterized, but now he manages to catch us with a poignant anti-war film that talks about the horrors of war. [Full review in Spanish]

Full Review | Original Score: 7/10 | Jun 27, 2020

I had a lot of problems with it, but I still found it entertaining and powerful.

Full Review | May 7, 2020

This movie was not skillfully made. It was not nuanced.

Hacksaw Ridge is certainly not for everybody, but I found it absolutely captivating, thought provoking, sometimes morally off kilter, but never compromised. If you can stomach the gore, you're in for one jaw-dropping experience.

Full Review | Apr 28, 2020

Hacksaw Ridge is an epic film of the grandest tradition.

Full Review | Mar 30, 2020

The cinematography, editing, and sound pack a surprising amount of suspense, no small feat considering audiences know the outcome.

Full Review | Jan 14, 2020

Hacksaw Ridge is masterful filmmaking!

Full Review | Oct 31, 2019

Schmaltzy and hackneyed, despite some glaring bits of hard-won, gritty emotion.

Full Review | Original Score: 2/5 | Oct 3, 2019

Feels like a movie made during World War II to drum up enlistments - with all the dodgy moralising that entails.

Full Review | Sep 1, 2019

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Film Review: ‘Hacksaw Ridge’

Mel Gibson has made a movie about a pacifist who served nobly during WWII. It's a testament to his filmmaking chops, and also an act of atonement that may succeed in bringing Gibson back.

By Owen Gleiberman

Owen Gleiberman

Chief Film Critic

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'Hacksaw Ridge' Review: Mel Gibson's War World II Film

Mel Gibson ’s “ Hacksaw Ridge ” is a brutally effective, bristlingly idiosyncratic combat saga — the true story of a man of peace caught up in the inferno of World War II. It’s the first movie Gibson has directed since “Apocalypto,” 10 years ago (a film he’d already shot before the scandals that engulfed him), and this November, when it opens with a good chance of becoming a player during awards season, it will likely prove to be the first film in a decade that can mark his re-entry into the heart of the industry. Yet to say that “Hacksaw Ridge” finally leaves the Gibson scandals behind isn’t quite right; it has been made in their shadow. On some not-so-hard-to-read level, the film is conceived and presented as an act of atonement.

It should be obvious by now that the question of whether we can separate a popular actor or filmmaker’s off-screen life from his on-screen art doesn’t have a one-size-fits-all answer. Every instance is different. In the case of Mel Gibson, what we saw a number of years ago — first in his anti-Semitic comments, then in leaked recordings of his phone conversations — wasn’t simply “objectionable” thoughts, but a rage that suggested he had a temperament of emotional violence. It was one that reverberated through his two most prominent films as a director: “The Passion of the Christ,” a sensational and, in many quarters, unfairly disdained religious psychodrama that was a serious attempt to grapple with the stakes of Christ’s sacrifice, and “Apocalypto,” a fanciful but mesmerizing Mayan adventure steeped to the bone in the ambiguous allure of blood and death.

Like those two movies, “Hacksaw Ridge” is the work of a director possessed by the reality of violence as an unholy yet unavoidable truth. The film takes its title from a patch of battleground on the Japanese island of Okinawa, at the top of a 100-foot cliff, that’s all mud and branches and bunkers and foxholes, and where the fight, when it arrives (one hour into the movie), is a gruesome cataclysm of terror. Against the nonstop clatter of machine-gun fire, bombs and grenades explode with a relentless random force, blowing off limbs and blasting bodies in two, and fire is everywhere, erupting from the explosions and the tips of flame-throwers. Bullets rip through helmets and chests, and half-dead soldiers sprawl on the ground, their guts hanging out like hamburger.

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Yet at the center of this modern hell of machine-tooled chaos and pain, there is Desmond Doss ( Andrew Garfield ), a soldier who refuses to carry a gun because it is against his values. He’s a conscientious objector who acts as a medic. But because he’s every bit as devoted to serving in the war as he is to never once firing a bullet, he isn’t just caring for soldiers. He’s on the front lines, in the thick of the thick of it, without a weapon to protect him, and the film exalts not just his courage but his whole withdrawal from violence.

There really was a Desmond Doss, and the film sticks close to the facts of his story. Yet there’s still something very programmatic about “Hacksaw Ridge.” It immerses you in the violent madness of war — and, at the same time, it roots its drama in the impeccable valor of a man who, by his own grace, refuses to have anything to do with war. You could argue that Gibson, as a filmmaker, is having his bloody cake and eating it too, but the less cynical (and more accurate) way to put it might be that “Hacksaw Ridge” is a ritual of renunciation. The film stands on its own (if you’d never heard of Mel Gibson, it would work just fine), yet there’s no point in denying that it also works on the level of Gibsonian optics — that it speaks, on some political-metaphorical level, to the troubles that have defined him and that he’s now making a bid to transcend.

Will audiences, and the powers of Hollywood, finally meet him halfway? One reason the likely answer is “yes” is that “Hacksaw Ridge,” unlike such landmarks of combat cinema as “Saving Private Ryan,” “Platoon,” or “Full Metal Jacket,” isn’t simply a devastating war film. It is also a carefully carpentered drama of moral struggle that, for its first hour, feels like it could have been made in the 1950s. It’s a movie that spells out its themes with a kind of homespun user-friendly clarity. We see Desmond as a boy, growing up in a small town on the edge of the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia with a drunken abusive father (Hugo Weaving) and a mother (Rachel Griffiths) he’s driven to protect. Early on, Desmond gets into a fight with his brother and hits him in the head with a brick, and that incident, which leaves him reeling in sorrow, is the film’s version of one of those “Freudian” events that, in an old Hollywood movie, form the cornerstone of a person’s character.

It all seems a bit pat, but once Desmond grows up and Andrew Garfield starts playing him, the actor, all lanky charm and aw-shucks modesty, wins us over to seeing Desmond as country boy of captivating conviction. He knows nothing about girls, yet he woos a lovely local nurse (Teresa Palmer) with a fumbling sincerity that melts her resistance. And when the war arrives, he enlists, just like his brother, because he feels he has no choice not to. He’s a Seventh Day Adventist scarred by violence in his family; all of this plays a role in his pacifism, and his patriotism. That difficult dad of his is portrayed by Hugo Weaving as a haunted, complex man: a slovenly lush who tries to keep his family in line with the belt, and even the pistol, but also a decorated veteran of World War I who is desperate to keep his sons alive.

The film revs up its old-fashioned pulse when it lands at boot camp, where Desmond proves a contradiction that no one there — not his fellow soldiers, let alone the officers — can begin to fathom. He’s an eager, good-guy recruit who refuses to pick up a rifle even for target practice; they assume (wrongly) that he must be a coward. For a while, the film is strikingly reminiscent of the legendary Parris Island boot-camp sequence in “Full Metal Jacket,” only this is WWII, so it’s less nihilistic, with Vince Vaughn, as the drill sergeant, tossing off the wholesome version of the usual hazing insult zingers; he looks at Desmond and barks, “I have seen stalks of corn with better physiques.” (Hence Desmond’s Army nickname: Cornstalk.) “Hacksaw Ridge” often feels like an old studio-system platoon movie, but when Desmond’s pacifism becomes a political issue within the Army, it turns into a turbulent ethical melodrama — one can almost imagine it as a military courtroom drama directed by Otto Preminger and starring Montgomery Clift.

The question is whether the Army will allow Desmond, on his own terms, to remain a soldier — a conscientious objector who nevertheless wants to go to war. In a sense, the dramatic issue is a tad hazy, since Desmond announces, from the outset, that he wants to be a medic. Why can’t he just become one? But one of the strengths of “Hacksaw Ridge” is that it never caricatures the military brass’s objections to his plan. On the battlefront without a weapon, Desmond could conceivably be placing his fellow soldiers in harm’s way. His desire is noble, but it doesn’t fit in with Army regulations (and the Army, of course, is all about regulations). So he’s threatened with a court martial. The way this is finally resolved is quietly moving, not to mention just.

And then … the hell of war. It’s 1945, and the soldiers from Desmond’s platoon join forces with other troops to take Hacksaw Ridge, a crucial stretch — it looks like a Japanese version of the land above Normandy beach — that can lead them, potentially, to a victory in Okinawa, and the beginning of the end of the war. Gibson’s staging of the horror of combat generates enough shock and awe to earn comparison to the famous opening sequence of “Saving Private Ryan,” although it must be said that he borrows a lot from (and never matches) Spielberg’s virtuosity. Yet Gibson creates a blistering cinematic battleground all his own. Each time the fight breaks out again, it’s so relentless that you wonder how anyone could survive it.

The real story that “Hacksaw Ridge” is telling, of course, is Desmond’s, and Gibson stages it in straightforward anecdotes of compassion under fire, though without necessarily finding anything revelatory in the sight of a courageous medic administering to his fellow soldiers (and, at certain points, even to wounded Japanese), tying their blown-off limbs with tourniquets, giving them shots of morphine between murmured words of hope, and dragging them to safety. In a sense, the real drama is a nobility that won’t speak its name: It’s the depth of Desmond’s fearlessness, and his love for his soldier brothers, which we believe in, thanks to Garfield’s reverent performance, but which doesn’t create a combat drama that’s either scary or exciting enough to rival the classic war movies of our time. This isn’t a great one; it’s just a good one (which is nothing to sneeze at).

Desmond devises a way to save lives by tying a rope around the soldiers’ bodies and lowering them down the vertical stone cliff that borders Hacksaw Ridge, and using that technique he rescues a great many of them. Desmond Doss, who saved 75 men at Hacksaw Ridge, became the first conscientious objector to receive the Medal of Honor, and Gibson has made a movie that’s a fitting tribute to him (at the end, he features touching footage of the real Doss). But one surprise, given the drama of pacifism-versus-war that the movie has set up, is that there’s never a single scene in which Desmond has to consider violating his principles and picking up a weapon in order to save himself or somebody else. A scene like that would have brought the two sides of “Hacksaw Ridge,” the violent and the pacifist — and, implicitly, the two sides of Mel Gibson — crashing together. But that would have been a different movie. One that, in the end, was a little less safe.

Reviewed at Venice Film Festival, Sept. 4, 2016. Running time: 131 MIN.

Production: A Summit Entertainment release of a Cross Creek Pictures, IM Global, Icon Productions, AI-Film, Pandemonium Films, Permut Presentations, Windy Hill Pictures, Vendian Entertainment, Demarest Media, Kilburn Media production. Producers: William Mechanic, David Permut, Terry Benedict, Paul Currie, Bruce Davey, William D. Johnson, Tyler Thompson, Brian Oliver. Executive producers: Michael Bassick, David S. Greathouse, Mark C. Manuel, Ted O’Neal, Buddy Patrick, Suzanne Warren, Christopher Woodrow.
Crew: Director: Mel Gibson. Screenplay: Robert Schenkkan, Andrew Knight. Camera (color, widescreen): Simon Duggan. Editor: John Gilbert.
With: Andrew Garfield, Sam Worthington, Luke Bracey, Teresa Palmer, Hugo Weaving, Rachel Griffiths, Vince Vaughn.

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Shock and gore … Hacksaw Ridge is offered up as the ultimate redemption for Gibson himself.

Hacksaw Ridge review – Mel Gibson's war drama piles on the gore

Andrew Garfield delivers a sympathetic performance as a soldier who refuses to carry a gun in this powerful real-life story of heroism in world war two

C ombat medic and conscientious objector Desmond Doss, played by Andrew Garfield in this true story from the second world war, is crouching in a crater at the Battle of Okinawa. With the terrifying uproar of war all around, fellow soldier Zane (Luke Pegler) mutters that he still can’t believe Doss is crazy enough not to carry a weapon. “I never claimed to be sane!” grins Doss. Actually, that is exactly what he claimed to be. An earlier scene in this movie showed Doss insisting to a US army physician that he was not mad, did not hear voices from God and had no intention of accepting a psychiatric discharge. Doss was a patriot who had volunteered for military service after Pearl Harbor, but his Seventh Day Adventist convictions and memories of violent abuse in his own family meant he wanted simply to be a doctor on the field of battle. No gun. Doss was finally decorated for rescuing dozens of wounded comrades from a part of the steep and heavily defended Maeda Escarpment, nicknamed Hacksaw Ridge.

It is a story of courage, robustly told by director Mel Gibson with screenwriters Robert Schenkkan and Andrew Knight, who create a brutally, even unwatchably violent picture of war. Garfield himself delivers a sympathetic, plausible performance: more mature and substantial than his contribution to Martin Scorsese’s Silence. Yet there is something missing.

Hacksaw Ridge is a war movie that naturally aspires to more than just gung-ho exploits and is offered up as prime awards bait, and the ultimate redemption for Gibson himself, who 11 years ago disgraced himself with bigoted slurs and a drunken antisemitic rant: “Jews are responsible for all the wars in the world!” You might even be forgiven for wondering if making a war movie about a soldier who avoided fighting was Gibson’s way of triangulating a path out of all that.

Andrew Garfield and Teresa Palmer in Hacksaw Ridge.

Doss is a regular guy who shows an untrained knack for medical skill when he uses his belt to apply a tourniquet, saving the life of a man who had shattered his leg in a car accident. In the hospital, he falls in love with a nurse Dorothy (Teresa Palmer) and proposes marriage, but breaks his dad’s heart when he tells him he’s going to enlist. This is Tom Doss (Hugo Weaving), a man still haunted by the friends he lost in the first world war and who has retreated into miserable, aggressive boozing. When he joins up, Doss infuriates Sergeant Howell (a slightly miscast Vince Vaughn) and Captain Glover (Sam Worthington) with his conscientious objection. He is bullied and beaten, but winds up earning the respect of the very men who made his life a torment.

Doss is repeatedly and fiercely challenged by the army on his refusal to bear arms, but no one points out that, unarmed or not, he wants to use medical skills to assist the uniformed killers and make the war machine of death run more smoothly. The basis of his “conscientious cooperation” is not in fact investigated all that rigorously.

As for the battle scenes themselves, they are undoubtedly well shot. Gibson shows some of the storytelling relish he had in his jungle drama Apocalypto (2006) and the insatiable taste for blood and guts he demonstrated in his controversial The Passion of the Christ (2004). It looks almost like a second world war horror film, as if the excessive violence is there to make up for the hero’s non-violence. Yet, apart from the gore, the story it tells is pretty conventional, and there are even times during the extended battle sequences that the dramatic tension slackens.

It is more gruesome but less ruminative than Spielberg’s Saving Private Ryan (1998) and less surreal than Sam Fuller’s The Big Red One (1980). Strangely, the film it reminded me of more was Clint Eastwood’s Heartbreak Ridge (1986), and not just because of the title echo. Eastwood’s grizzled old gunnery sergeant sees action in the Grenada invasion of 1983, disproving the modern namby-pambys who had disapproved of his methods. When the chips were down, they did need him and his values after all. Like Doss.

Hacksaw Ridge is an old-fashioned war film, melded with a kind of new-fashioned explicitly violent drama. A shooting war is still exciting. Desmond Doss renounced his weapon. Mel Gibson wants to hold on to his.

Hacksaw Ridge
Peter Bradshaw's film of the week
Andrew Garfield
Drama films
Action and adventure films
Second world war

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Metacritic reviews

Hacksaw ridge.

83 The Film Stage Rory O'Connor The Film Stage Rory O'Connor While derivative and endlessly cheesy, it’s a characteristically visceral return for Gibson, and one that confirms that little has changed in the man’s singular artistic psyche.
80 The Guardian Andrew Pulver The Guardian Andrew Pulver As repellent a figure as many may still find Gibson, I have to report he’s absolutely hit Hacksaw Ridge out of the park.
80 The Hollywood Reporter David Rooney The Hollywood Reporter David Rooney Themes of courage, patriotism, faith and unwavering adherence to personal beliefs have been a constant through Gibson's directing projects, as has a fascination with bloodshed and gore. Those qualities serve this powerful true story of heroism without violence extremely well, overcoming its occasional cliched battle-movie tropes to provide stirring drama.
80 Time Out Dave Calhoun Time Out Dave Calhoun Overall, there aren’t many shades of gray in Hacksaw Ridge, but it’s a movie that fulfills its purpose with vigor, confidence and swagger, and those battle scenes are impossible to take your eyes off.
70 Screen Daily Fionnuala Halligan Screen Daily Fionnuala Halligan Hacksaw Ridge returns to the themes which have professionally and personally motivated 60-year-old Gibson for his entire life; he’s never been subtle, but he’s certainly effective when it comes to delivering his heart-felt message.
70 Variety Owen Gleiberman Variety Owen Gleiberman Hacksaw Ridge is the work of a director possessed by the reality of violence as an unholy yet unavoidable truth.
65 TheWrap Alonso Duralde TheWrap Alonso Duralde While Hacksaw Ridge is undeniably made with great care and skill, for all of its good intentions it can never refute that famous Truffaut observation that making an anti-war film is essentially impossible, since to portray something is to ennoble it. In celebrating this legendary pacifist, Gibson and company ennoble the hell out of violence.
60 CineVue John Bleasdale CineVue John Bleasdale There's no getting away from it, Gibson has produced another bombastic, crowd-pleasing and obviously blood-soaked movie which expertly glorifies that which its hero was against.
50 The Playlist Jessica Kiang The Playlist Jessica Kiang Along with screenwriters Robert Schenkkan and Andrew Knight, Gibson, whose lack of directorial subtlety but skill with action both reach an apex here, is not content to tell the true story of Desmond Doss and his unshakeable, courage-giving faith. He wants to convince us that his faith was, in fact, the truth.
50 IndieWire Ben Croll IndieWire Ben Croll A blood-soaked, bone-crunching hymn to religious devotion and faith, Hacksaw Ridge doesn’t hum Mel Gibson’s favorite themes; it shouts them.
See all 47 reviews on Metacritic.com
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Hacksaw Ridge

Action/Adventure , Drama , War

Content Caution

In Theaters

November 4, 2016
Andrew Garfield as Desmond Doss; Teresa Palmer as Dorothy Schutte; Luke Bracey as Smitty; Hugo Weaving as Tom Doss; Sam Worthington as Captain Glover; Vince Vaughn as Sergeant Howell; Rachel Griffiths as Bertha Doss; Nathaniel Buzolic as Harold Doss

Home Release Date

February 21, 2017

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Movie review.

The Bible calls it a burning lake, a blazing furnace. Dante imagined it as nine circles of Sisyphean torture. Bosch colored it with our darkest nightmares. It’s been called Abaddon, Gehenna, Tophet, Hades.

Perhaps those who took part in the Battle of Okinawa have another name for hell: Hacksaw Ridge.

It’s the waning months of World War II. Germany has surrendered but Japan fights on, contesting every inch of land with ferocious tenacity. And as the United States military pushes ever closer to the Japanese homeland, the fighting grows more desperate, more horrific.

The U.S. turns its guns on Okinawa, just 340 miles from Japan. It pounds the island with fire as soldiers and marines scurry ashore. Japanese soldiers hide underground, determined to push the Americans into the ocean. Hacksaw Ridge is one of the island’s most contested points, and soon the ground lies smoking. Bodies litter it like autumn leaves; blood pools in foxholes and footprints; sounds of agony fill the sky. Countries may fight for this patch of land, but it’s Death that rules here. Death that wins.

But into that black, blasted game board scurries one slight, skinny man. He carries no gun: Indeed, he fought the U.S. Army for the right not to. Bandages, not bullets, fill his pockets. He alone seems to walk upright in this land of crawling, screaming flesh. He alone dares all in this doomscape of the dying.

“Please Lord,” he prays, his clothes soaked in the blood of others, his hands ripped open from the burn of rope. “Let me get one more.”

Desmond Doss finds another man, almost dead—skin torn away, muscles ripped, bone exposed. He gives the man a shot of morphine—American, Japanese, doesn’t matter—and hoists him to his back, returning to the face of a cliff where, below, lies sanctuary. There, at the top of the ridge, he secures the man to a rope and slowly lowers him down, the rope cutting deeper into his hands as he does. Once the man is down, Desmond breathes deep and turns his head again to the smoking ruins of Hacksaw Ridge.

“Please Lord,” he says again. “Let me get one more.”

And into hell he goes again.

Positive Elements

Hacksaw Ridge is based on the true story of Desmond Doss, the first conscientious objector to receive the Medal of Honor. The character that we meet here is pure, unalloyed hero.

Like many young men of the day, Desmond took the bombing of Pearl Harbor “personal” and was on fire to volunteer. Even though he could’ve stayed home if he wanted to, Desmond didn’t think it was right to stay behind while others fought in his place.

But Desmond also promised God that he’d never carry a weapon or kill another human being. And as you might expect, that creates a few problems once he and his squad move to the shooting range, preparing for war. Desmond explains to his superiors that he volunteered to save lives as a medic, not take them. And even under threat of a court martial, and despite the pleas of those closest to him, Desmond refuses to violate those personal convictions.

“With the world so set on tearing itself apart, it don’t seem like such a bad thing to me to put a little bit of it back together,” he says.

Desmond’s commander, sergeant and the rest of his company find the pacifist soldier’s stance to be peculiar at best, cowardly at worst. But Desmond proves, through his actions at Hacksaw Ridge, that he is no coward.

Spiritual Elements

Desmond’s stance on killing people stems from his deep religious convictions. As a fervent Seventh Day Adventist, he keeps his Saturday Sabbath. He reads his Bible constantly, even asking someone to retrieve it for him from a battlefield. His fellow soldiers sometimes mock him for his piety—sometimes it’s friendly teasing, sometimes more serious—but he never wavers. The closest Desmond comes to a spiritual crisis is amid the battle on Hacksaw Ridge after seeing a close friend die.

“What is it You want from me?” he asks of God. “I don’t understand. I can’t hear You.”

And then he hears the cry of “Medic!” and Desmond knows what he has to do.

[ Spoiler Warning ] After his daring feats become known, Desmond and his faith become a source of inspiration for his fellow soldiers. He violates his Sabbath just once; when his captain, Captain Glover, tells him that a renewed assault on Hacksaw Ridge is planned for Saturday and that the men won’t go without him. Even then, the captain and the rest of the company wait patiently—almost reverently—as Desmond prays for them all.

Desmond’s convictions took root early. A poster featuring the Lord’s Prayer and the Ten Commandments adorns the family home. And as a boy, Desmond is particularly drawn to the commandment “Thou shalt not kill,” which his mother tells him is the worst sin.

But it’s also clear that other deeply faithful people have come to different conclusions about that commandment. Glover tells Desmond, “I believe in [the Bible] as much as any man.” Desmond’s brother volunteers for the Army and, apparently, has no such anti-weaponry qualms. Dorothy, his love interest back home, cautions Desmond about his stubborn streak: “Don’t confuse your will with the Lord’s,” she says.

Desmond’s mother sings in a church choir. Desmond compares the choir to angels … though not necessarily musical ones. A bombed-out church stands on a bleached battlefield. Someone wears a cross, putting it in his mouth during battle. Desmond recites a portion of Isaiah 40.

Sexual Content

Desmond is attracted to Dorothy from the moment he sets eyes on her, telling his folks that he plans to marry her. He asks her to a movie and, afterward, steals a kiss. She smacks him, telling Desmond that he needs to ask first. But she forgives him and they continue to date. They kiss several more times before they get married. Their wedding night is filmed with restraint. We see Desmond shirtless, and we glimpse Dorothy in a demure white nighty before they kiss and collapse onto the bed, out of the view of the lens.

A member of Desmond’s company likes to go naked. We see his bare backside as he does chin-ups in the buff (as other soldiers rib him about his anatomy). He’s forced to remain unclothed when the company sergeant demands they begin training at that very moment. The guy climbs walls and scrambles through mud in the nude as the sergeant calls him a “exhibitionist degenerate” and seems to ask if he might also be into bestiality. While we never see him unclothed from the front, we do see plenty of his rear.

Soldiers about to go on leave talk about safe sex, condoms and venereal disease. When a fellow soldier spies Desmond’s Bible, he points to another member of the company who (he says) also reads the “Good Book.” The guy holds up a girlie magazine (nothing explicit is seen) and suggests that his reading material is indeed good. One of Desmond’s friends admits he never knew his father—only that it could’ve been one of ten guys. A sergeant tells the troops that their gun should be their “lover, their mistress, their concubine.”

Violent Content

Hacksaw Ridge features some of the most brutal depictions of war ever put to screen. It’s impossible to overstate the level to which we see men turned to meat.

The camera captures dozens, perhaps hundreds of casualties, many of them incredibly gruesome. Sometimes men have bits of their face and bodies chewed off a bullet at a time. Limbs are blown off, and Desmond sometimes carries these soldiers to safety, strips of flesh dangling from their ripped shirt sleeves or pant legs. Corpses litter the ground, their organs exposed and intestines spilled. Two men grapple with each other as one holds a live grenade, which eventually kills them both. Another grenade goes off under a corpse, partially disintegrating it in a shower of blood. Soldiers get bayonetted to death. Several are set alight by flamethrowers or explosions, running or writhing as the flames consume them. One man hangs himself. Another commits ritual suicide—stabbing himself in the gut and drawing the blade across before his assistant beheads him. (We see the blow land and the head fall away from the body.) Countless people try to staunch their own bleeding, screaming in pain. Countless corpses are shown, some being eaten by rats. Japanese soldiers calmly shoot or stab the wounded.

Desmond is attacked in the night by some of his bunkmates, leaving him bloodied and bruised. He’s harassed by Smitty, another soldier, who kicks him in the face during an obstacle-course run, then punches him in the bunkroom, calling him a coward. Desmond’s alcoholic father and a former war veteran, Tom, crushes a bottle of whiskey, cutting his hand. He describes how one of his friends in World War I was killed by a bullet in the back. The wound blasted the man’s internal organs out and, according to Tom, messed up his suit something terrible.

As boys, Desmond and brother Hal fight—Desmond eventually nearly killing his brother by thwacking him in the face with a brick. Tom, was physically abusive, too: Though we don’t see him beat his kids, Tom does struggle with the boys’ mother, gun in hand. As a teen, Desmond bursts into the room where the two are fighting, grabs the gun and nearly shoots Tom (as the dad begs him to pull the trigger). A man working on a truck has the vehicle fall on his leg, puncturing an artery: Blood squirts from the wound before Desmond staunches the bleeding with a makeshift tourniquet.

Crude or Profane Language

To appeal to a faith-based audience, director Mel Gibson reportedly edited out all the f-words and misuses of Jesus name from the film. And indeed, there are none of those to be heard. But plenty of other profanities are heard , including seven s-words and multiple uses of “a–,” “d–n,” “h—” and “p-ss.” We also hear crude slang for the male and female anatomy.

Drug and Alcohol Content

Tom, suffering from what we’d recognize today as post-traumatic stress disorder, is a “drunk,” according to Desmond. Most of the time when we see him he’s obviously inebriated, abusing his family or despising himself. Several soldiers smoke. Desmond injects injured soldiers with morphine.

Other Negative Elements

Soldiers refer to the Japanese enemy as “Nips” and “Japs,” and many seem to believe them to be inhuman monsters. The film does little to humanize them: For the most part, they are indeed seen as almost faceless, heartless opponents—perhaps reflecting how the battle felt to the Americans who took part. Still, it feels jarring today to have a movie spare so little empathy for the soldiers on the other side.

We see a soldier vomit.

As horrific as Hacksaw Ridge is, the real Battle of Okinawa was perhaps worse. It was one of the bloodiest conflicts in World War II’s Pacific Theater, with more than 14,000 Allied deaths (mostly American), more than 77,000 Japanese fatalities and thousands upon thousands of Okinawan civilian casualties—with some of those civilians used as human shields by the Japanese or encouraged to commit suicide.

Other horrors are also kept from us in the film: The fact that Japan pushed middle school-aged boys into the front lines. In that era, the Japanese believed that death, even by suicide, was preferable to surrender. Okinawa’s horrific casualties reportedly were an important factor in the U.S.’s decision to drop the atomic bomb on Japan instead of invading the Japanese mainland.

Okinawa’s battlefield provides a fitting stage for director Mel Gibson, given his proclivity for violence in his movies. From Braveheart to The Passion of the Christ to A pocalypto , Gibson bathes the screen in blood, often using pain and destruction as a catalyst for stories about freedom and redemption. Gibson, a longtime Catholic, seems to believe quite literally in the saving power of blood.

Which makes Gibson’s selection of his newest on-screen hero—the conscientious objector Desmond Doss—an interesting one. A director long fascinated by violence tells the story of a man who eschews it. Instead of giving us a hero who would die for his people, he gives us a hero who lives—and lives to save others.

Hacksaw Ridge is riveting cinema. But it’s also bloody—as bloody as we’ve seen on screen for a long, long time. And while the horror and gore we see may impress upon us the depth Desmond’s heroism, these images nevertheless assault us with their unblinking depiction of this hellish battle’s carnage.

Paul Asay has been part of the Plugged In staff since 2007, watching and reviewing roughly 15 quintillion movies and television shows. He’s written for a number of other publications, too, including Time, The Washington Post and Christianity Today. The author of several books, Paul loves to find spirituality in unexpected places, including popular entertainment, and he loves all things superhero. His vices include James Bond films, Mountain Dew and terrible B-grade movies. He’s married, has two children and a neurotic dog, runs marathons on occasion and hopes to someday own his own tuxedo. Feel free to follow him on Twitter @AsayPaul.

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Hacksaw Ridge Review

27 Jan 2017

139 minutes

Hacksaw Ridge

Forget what you’ve heard about Hacksaw Ridge ’s pacifist hero, because Andrew Garfield does take up arms in the heat of battle. It isn’t, we’d hasten to add, in an orgy of Arnie-like bloodletting. Instead, he uses a rifle and blanket to improvise a sleigh to pull a stricken soldier to safety as said soldier opens fire on the advancing enemy like a demented Radagast. It’s a rare moment of action-movie fun in Mel Gibson’s film — a bit of Lethal Weapon in a sea of Apocalypto as we’re plunged terrifyingly into the Pacific war.

An old-fashioned story that Gibson mainlines with bleeding-edge craft and technique.

At the heart of this cinematic cyclone is a more conventional character study of Garfield’s devout Seventh-day Adventist Desmond Doss. Torn by his need to serve in the fight against Japan and a strict moral code that prevents him from taking life, he signs up as a medic, hoping to do his duty by saving lives instead of taking them.

Using a Full Metal Jacket -like structure, the film follows first Doss’ basic training, then his time in combat. He meets and falls for a local nurse ( Lights Out ’s Teresa Palmer) in a romantic subplot that’s just the right side of saccharine, before heading to boot camp where he endures beatings, bullying and abuse from officers and men alike, with Vince Vaughn stealing scenes as an aggressive, motormouth drill instructor. Picking on his new recruit, he unleashes putdowns R. Lee Ermey would be proud of (“Make sure you keep this man away from strong winds,” he orders of the slight Doss). The men, following his lead, soon make Doss’ life a daily hell. The wannabe medic, though, won’t crack.

The combat sequences, set on a blasted, blood-soaked Okinawan ridge in 1945 and recreated in micro-detail in Australia, are filmed in pure Viscera Vision — they blaze and roar with the expression of pure violence. Like Saving Private Ryan ’s opening salvos, only at altitude, the thick fug of smoke, cordite and blood leaves you gasping for air. In this maelstrom, Doss’ acts of raw courage provide a much-needed focal point. As the battle for command of the island swings one way and then the other, he saves first one, then another and finally dozens of Ryans. The complexities of his moral stance fall away, replaced by the simple maths of saving lives.

It’s a moving recreation of a khaki-clad superhero at work, an old-fashioned story that Gibson mainlines with bleeding-edge craft and technique — he’s lost little of his knack for spectacle. But as with some of his previous work, the hero is occasionally depicted as an almost Christ-like figure — one shot could be renamed ‘The Passion Of The Doss’ — leaving it to Garfield’s humble hero to keep the man grounded and relatable.

The former Spidey, imbuing the open-hearted Doss with steel and dignity (and nailing the accent), is the warm anchor the film needs. Between this and Silence , two contrasting tales of faith in an unforgiving world, any memories of the sad end to his webslinging days should be well and truly banished.

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‘Hacksaw Ridge’ review

Inspiring yet haunting, ‘hacksaw ridge’ finds the sublime in suffering.

Can art be a form of atonement?

That seems to be the case Mel Gibson is trying to make. After a ten-year absence from directing — his last run at the helm in Apocalypto arrived between a drunk driving arrest and leaked recordings of bigoted rants — Gibson is back with Hacksaw Ridge , a war film that boldly finds bravery in pacifism. If this film is a form of penance, it is a medieval one; Gibson flogs his characters, but that makes the ultimate catharsis all the more sweet.

The film is based on the true story of Desmond Doss, a Seventh Day Adventist and conscientious objector who enlisted in the U.S. Army as a medic. Doss refused to even carry a weapon due to his beliefs, despite pressure from peers and commanders. Hacksaw Ridge opens on a battlefield, blood spurting and bodies flying gracefully in a ballet of limbs. The film then begins an extended flashback, tracing Doss’ life from childhood up through his enlistment and deployment, during which time he faces scorn for his pacifist views.

Gibson does not shy away from the grotesque, but he also does not revel in it.

Lanky and quick to give a sheepish grin, Doss is unlike most war heroes in film. This is a man who must suffer for his beliefs, and willingly persist in that suffering. Although he puts a bit too much twang into his Appalachian accent, Garfield does an excellent job in the role. He makes the character believable as a man who wants to serve his country and his God, despite the pressure from both ends.

The rest of the casting is largely good. Hugo Weaving brings humanity to Doss’ father, a World War I veteran twisted by his time in war. Theresa Palmer brings a cheerful grace to her role as Doss’ fiancée, Dorothy, although the film does not give her much to do

As expected for a war movie, Doss and his fellow soldiers form a colorful cast of personalities under the command of strict leaders. Their direct commander is no-nonsense drill instructor Sergeant Howell (Vince Vaughn), who wastes no time breaking them down with some biting insults. Vaughn is stepping into the well-trod role of vicious drill sergeant — think R. Lee Ermey in Full Metal Jacket — and he is out of his depth. He lacks the grit to be truly menacing, coming across more as a grumpy gym teacher. The script is at least strong enough to keep the character entertaining.

Far more comfortable in their roles are Sam Worthington as Captain Glover, who barely hides his disdain for Doss, and Luke Bracey as Smitty, a tough guy who swells with machismo.

The centerpiece of the film is the battle to take the titular ridge, which will serve as the launching point for a full-scale takeover of Okinawa. Ever the stylist, Gibson finds in the ridge a potent metaphor for spiritual struggle. Filmed from the ground, Hacksaw Ridge seems impossibly tall, as if the men must storm the gates of Heaven. Ironically, Hell waits above.

Although he puts a bit too much twang into his Appalachian accent, Garfield does an excellent job in the role

Gibson’s films have long had a fascination with violence, both physical and spiritual. In his hands, the battle for Hacksaw Ridge is not merely an attempt to seize control of the battlefield; it is a crucible for the soul. The film takes on the atmosphere of a horror movie, more than any other war film in recent memory. The battle scenes are long and gruesome, as the camera lingers on images of shredded limbs and wailing faces. The human body, as Hacksaw Ridge sees it, is only so much meat.

If this all sounds ghastly, it is, but that is the nature of war. Gibson does not shy away from the grotesque, but he also does not revel in it. There is nothing glorious in the film’s portrayal of war, though it does find virtue in the men fighting.

Gibson prefers his imagery to be striking rather than subtle, even outside of combat. There is a particular scene in which Doss, covered in blood and ash, washes himself clean, sunlight pouring through the water. The comparison with baptism is obvious, but the scene is so beautiful in the moment that it hardly matters. Hacksaw Ridge occasionally goes too far with its presentation, almost to the point of being comical. Ultimately, though, it succeeds far more than it stumbles.

Will Hacksaw Ridge redeem Gibson in the eyes of Hollywood? It seems like it could, given the reception so far. Even if it does not, the film reestablishes Gibson as one of the most talented big-budget directors around. Hacksaw Ridge is a grueling war film, but the suffering is worth it for the spiritual ends. Better yet, the film highlights one of World War II’s most unlikely heroes: a man who saved many lives on the battlefield without taking any.

2024 has, thus far, been kind of a strange year for movies. While there have been some marquee titles in theaters like The Fall Guy, and some breakout hits on streaming like Scoop, thanks in large part to the strikes that lasted for months on end, there are fewer movies than we might normally expect.

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‘Hacksaw Ridge’ Review: Mel Gibson Returns With a War Movie About Peace

By Peter Travers

Peter Travers

Mel Gibson is back, directing the bloody hell out of a war movie about … peace. You may have issues with the star’s past history of anger and intolerance. But you’ll have no issue with Hacksaw Ridge, a movie about a different kind of brave heart. It’s the fact-based, World War II story of Private First Class Desmond T. Doss, the first conscientious objector to receive the Congressional Medal of Honor. Andrew Garfield , in the best performance of his career to date, plays Desmond, a feisty kid out of Virginia’s Blue Ridge mountains who swears never to pick up a gun (he almost killed his daddy with one) and swears just as vehemently to go into combat as a medic. How does this cornstalk-skinny pacifist, a devoted Seventh-Day Adventist, enter the front lines where you shoot to kill just to stay alive?

That’s the heart of the film that Gibson directs with no-bull sincerity from a script by Robert Schenkkan ( The Pacific ) and Andrew Knight that digs past clichés to touch a raw nerve. Desmond’s father, Tom (a superb Hugo Weaving), is so traumatized by his service in World War I that he forbids his sons to enlist. The boys, who’ve have no problem defying Dad when he drunkenly abuses their mother, Bertha (Rachel Griffiths), defy him again. Desmond’s brother Hal (Nathaniel Buzolic) enlists soon after the Japanese bomb Pearl Harbor. And our hero, though crazy in love with Dorothy (the excellent Teresa Palmer), a nurse at the hospital where he gets medical schooling, is determined to follow.

Basic training takes on new layers of meaning as Desmond shirks no duty, except for rifle practice. That decision angers both Sgt. Howell (Vince Vaughn, doing gruff) and the fellow recruits, who mistake his principles for cowardice. Attempts are made to drive this renegade out of the Army, even using the threat of court-martial. Desmond’s dad turns up in an unexpected defense of his son. It’s a tribute to Garfield’s total commitment to the role that he never lets easy sentiment color the force of the character’s convictions.

Not surprisingly, it’s the scenes of battle that send Hacksaw Ridge roaring to life, with Gibson and cinematographer Simon Duggan refusing to flinch from the harsh realities of ground warfare. The rocky slope from which the film takes its title is the Japanese stronghold that Desmond’s battalion must destroy before they can take Okinawa. Gibson captures the most brutal and bloody screen carnage since his own Braveheart and the opening sequence of Steven Spielberg’s Saving Private Ryan. And it’s here that Desmond, staying behind as his troops are forced to pull out, repeatedly returns amid bullets, bombs and grenade blasts, to round up wounded soldiers, 75 in all, and lower them by rope down the ridge and to safety.

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Thanks to some of the greatest battle scenes ever filmed, Gibson once again shows his staggering gifts as a filmmaker, able to juxtapose savagery with aching tenderness. There’s always been more than an adrenaline rush in his work: Look at Braveheart (for which he won the Oscar as best director), The Passion of the Christ (the most successful R-rated indie film of all-time) and the masterful, misunderstood Apocalypto, released a decade ago – i.e., roughly about the time LA cops got him on a DUI and his rants put him in the public doghouse. Hacksaw Ridge is being touted as Gibson’s comeback. Is it also an atonement? Who can say? What’s clear is that Gibson has made a film about family, faith, love and forgiveness all put the test in an arena of violent conflict – a movie you don’t want to miss.

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Movie review: ‘Hacksaw Ridge’

Mel Gibson's gory new war film tells the true story of Private First Class Desmond Doss — in a strong performance by Andrew Garfield — a World War II American Army medic and conscientious objector who wanted to save lives, not take them.

(Rated: 14A [Canada] and R [MPAA] for intense, prolonged, realistically graphic sequences of war violence, including grisly, bloody images; directed by Mel Gibson; stars Andrew Garfield, Vince Vaughn, Hugo Weaving, Sam Worthington , Teresa Palmer and Rachel Griffiths; run time: 139 min.)

Vocation and conviction shine in war movie

By Ted Giese

Mel Gibson’s “Hacksaw Ridge” tells the true story of Private First Class Desmond Doss (Andrew Garfield), a World War II American Army medic who served during the Battle of Okinawa in 1945. The twist in this war film is that Doss, as a faithful Seventh Day Adventist, was a conscientious objector or, as he liked to say, a “conscientious cooperator.”

Telling the story in two parts, Gibson details events in Doss’ life leading up to the battle, and then his involvement in the battle itself — for which he was awarded a Medal of Honor citation.

Based on his religious convictions, Doss’ refusal to use or even hold a gun caused him considerable trouble during basic training and made it difficult for fellow soldiers to trust him with their lives.

Superior officers didn’t help. Comments made by men like Drill Sergeant Howell (Vince Vaughn) — “Private Doss does not believe in violence … do not look to him to save you on the battlefield” — only exacerbated the situation.

The irony is that Doss, whose only desire was to serve as a field medic, was in fact there to do just that — save fellow soldiers on the battlefield.

Doss’ childhood family life was devout but less than desirable, with an alcoholic and abusive father, Tom Doss (Hugo Weaving). The family home featured a framed copy of “The Lord’s Prayer” and the Ten Commandments, which included an illustration of Cain murdering his brother, Abel. This unique piece of art had a lasting impact on Doss, as did seeing his drunken father threaten to shoot a family member in their home.

These childhood memories solidified his desire to save — rather than take — lives.

While Doss’ religious convictions — including his refusal to work on Saturdays — act as the film’s heart and soul, Gibson is careful to point out that not all Christians share these same convictions.

Sadly, to create dramatic tension, Christians who didn’t share Doss’ pacifism are almost monolithically depicted as insensitive brutes and bullies.

While this is accurate, the trouble is that for dramatic reasons Gibson sets up a false dichotomy as a sort of straw-man argument during most of the film when, in the end, it’s the cooperation of Doss’ religious convictions with those of the combat soldiers that wins the day.

This becomes clear in the film’s last act, when the soldiers who had previously been set against Doss finally respect him and admire his valor.

The vocation of “soldier” is ultimately emphasized as being godly in a short scene where Captain Jack Glover (Sam Worthington) holds off the final push to take Okinawa’s Maeda Escarpment (dubbed Hacksaw Ridge) on the morning of Saturday, May 5, 1945. Glover delays the final push until Doss finishes praying.

After the prayer, Captain Glover says to the infantrymen, “Let’s go to work.” Within the ensuing battle, multiple scenes show respect and cooperation between Doss and the rest of the soldiers.

Christian viewers will want to remember that the vocation of soldier is not one that embraces murder. The Fifth Commandment, “You shall not murder” (Exodus 20:13), isn’t a blanket prohibition against all killing. So the vocation of soldier can involve killing that is not murder.

Soldiers operate under the governing authorities, and as such, they are God’s servants carrying out God’s wrath on the wrongdoer (Romans 13:4).

It’s good to note that when soldiers came to John the Baptizer asking what they should do to avoid the judgment of God, he doesn’t say, “Give up your work as soldier” but rather “Do not extort money from anyone by threats or by false accusation, and be content with your wages” (Luke 3:14).

Like all God-pleasing vocations, soldiers are expected to execute their work virtuously on and off the battlefield.

Gibson, who directed films like “Braveheart” (1995) and “Apocalypto” (2006), is no stranger to war films. While the first half of the film includes Doss’ romance with a young nurse named Dorothy (Teresa Palmer), the latter half is set on the battlefield, where Gibson pulls no punches, especially in the film’s first battle scene, which is particularly jarring and gory. This makes “Hacksaw Ridge” as sour as it is sweet.

Doss’ optimism and faith are sent through the meat grinder of combat and they come out strengthened, not crushed.

Gibson sets the stage for this crucible of faith by beginning the film with a voice-over of Doss on the battlefield reciting Isaiah 40:30-31: “Even youths shall faint and be weary, and young men shall fall exhausted; but they who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings like eagles; they shall run and not be weary; they shall walk and not faint.”

Doss is shown as a man who reads Scripture, and he keeps a small Bible with him — even on the battlefield. He also is depicted as a man who prays. His prayer life is rich and to the point.

When finding himself alone on the escarpment after the rest of the American army had retreated, Doss continues rescuing wounded men from the battlefield, lowering them down one by one, praying, “Lord, help me get one more.”

By the end of the night he’d saved 75 men — daring work that gains him the respect of his fellow soldiers.

With “Hacksaw Ridge,” Gibson seems to be redeeming himself within the Hollywood system, which bodes well for future projects like his rumored sequel to “The Passion of the Christ” (2004).

Garfield’s strong performance as Private Doss is also a welcome surprise as he stars in the upcoming Martin Scorsese film “Silence” (2016), where he plays a Jesuit priest working as a missionary in 17th century feudal Japan amidst persecution.

“Hacksaw Ridge” is not for everyone. The gory battle scenes justify the film’s R rating.

However, this film takes Christian faith seriously and encourages viewers toward virtuous and ethical living within their vocations. By valuing conviction, the film could challenge reflective viewers to think about whether their personal convictions in life are defensible.

Christian viewers also might want to think about that, based on the whole counsel of the Word of God.

When it comes to Christian faith in the midst of war, “Hacksaw Ridge” easily takes its place alongside recent films like “Fury” (2014) and “Unbroken” (2014).

The Rev. Ted Giese ( [email protected] ) is pastor of Mount Olive Lutheran Church , Regina, Saskatchewan, Canada; a contributor to the Canadian Lutheran , Reporter Online and KFUO.org ; and movie reviewer for the “ Issues, Etc. ” radio program. Follow Pastor Giese on Twitter @RevTedGiese .

Posted December 2, 2016

Contributing Writer

In december’s ‘lutheran witness’, reformation relevance: mary and her child.

This website give a slightly different view of some of the dramatizations in the movie.

http://www.historyvshollywood.com/reelfaces/hacksaw-ridge/

I get the feeling that, as an Adventist, they have a somewhat works righteousness orientation in their deeds, as opposed to the Christian Vocation slant this review gives.

says Dorothy. “He was a good Christian and I figured he would help me go to Heaven. That’s what I told my mother.”

Well written and very balanced. As a veteran who did not have to fight like they did, I appreciated the review.

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“Hacksaw Ridge” Movie Review

Jacob Miller , Reporter | December 22, 2016

Mel Gibson is an incredibly talented filmmaker, possibly one of the best. His films have an uncommon grit and realism lacking in many of today’s most dramatic pictures. He is not afraid of pushing the envelope, of crafting scenes that will leave people cringing or peeking from behind their fingers. Yet, there is also a tenderness that he harnesses throughout the scenes where there is no need for excruciating violence. “Hacksaw Ridge” depicts both sides of his film making abilities in equal measures and it is his best work.

“Hacksaw Ridge” follows the true story of Desmond Doss (Andrew Garfield), a pacifist who joins the US army as a medic during World War II. Doss took the attack on Pearl Harbor personally and he deems it unfair for many of the men he grew up with, including his brother, to go and risk their lives for their country while he sits at home nice and safe. His one and only condition: He refuses to even touch a gun.

His conviction towards his pacifism stems from various violent events occurring within his past, most of which involve his drunken father (Hugo Weaving). Weaving, who is mostly prone to playing straight-faced characters, often villains, it was interesting to witness a more grounded performance, and one that lacked the usual theatrics that he is known for. Weaving is a very talented actor who does not get enough time to shine in Hollywood, and his performance as Tom Doss grants him a fair amount of screen time to show us what we’ve been missing. He is brutal and relentless towards his family, especially when he hits the drink, beating and punishing his children often, directing a fair amount of the violence towards his wife, which is what Desmond has the biggest problem with. Weaving conveys a brutality in his performance, but also a quiet serenity during the scenes in which he is not a drunken brute. After years of seeing his best friends die during World War I, he hates himself more than anything, and it shows.

Tom Doss visits the graves of his military comrades often and he makes sure to show his children exactly what he lost. He says to Desmond, “I don’t want to have to come visit you here one day.” Desmond understands his father’s predicament; however, he knows what he must do, and he enlists as a conscientious objector in the army and leaves home shortly after his brother. He wants to be a medic and refuses to pick up a gun. He says he’ll be defending his country by saving lives rather than taking them.

His training begins in Fort Jackson in South Carolina where he is placed under the command of Sergeant Howell (Vince Vaughn). Desmond excels physically, wowing his superior officers with his unbelievable stamina and work ethic; however, he quickly becomes an outcast when Howell’s platoon begins their rifle training and Desmond refuses to participate. “Your rifle will be the only thing you truly love,” Sergeant Howell says, “an extension of your body.”

Vince Vaughn, who most people know as the fast-talking goof from such comedies as “Wedding Crashers,” “Dodgeball” and “Swingers,” gives a performance unlike anything he has ever done. Vaughn has attempted dramatic roles in the past (“Psycho,” “The Lost World,” “Into the Wild”), but he has never managed to give a memorable performance. Here, he commands the screen as the intense platoon commander. His performance is in the vein of R. Lee Ermey’s Gunnery Sergeant Hartman from “Full Metal Jacket,” spouting insults and spit into the new recruits faces as if his life depended on it. His comedy experience helped prepare him for this role as his wit is just as sharp as his bite.

The first half of “Hacksaw Ridge” showcases Mel Gibson’s knack for slow-paced drama. Like the scenes of romance between Gibson’s William Wallace and Catherine McCormack’s Murron, Gibson crafts a tender and sweet love story out of Desmond and Dorothy Schutte (Teresa Palmer), a nurse whom Desmond meets before he goes off to war. The two actors have a delightful chemistry as well as contagious interplay that make their relationship feel real and up the stakes during the scenes where Desmond must run through the line of fire. Their relationship feels organic, which is uncommon in a movie such as this where many other filmmakers would have gone for the far easier route of manipulating the audience with clichés and melodrama.

The other quarter of the first half ditches the tenderness, but offers a heaping helping of brutal attacks to the human spirit. The scenes concerning basic training are what you would expect from a war movie, up until Sergeant Howell and his platoon realize Desmond will not pick up a gun where the once equally distributed abuse becomes much more aimed and at one recruit in particular. This is where Andrew Garfield really shines. It is a far more subtle side to his performance than during the first quarter or second half, but it is all the more effective as he is verbally destroyed, humiliated, beaten, and hated by both his commanding officer as well as his platoon. They call him a coward, he stays silent. Even when a group of recruits beat Desmond senseless in the night, he stays silent, not resorting to violence or even giving up the names of the assailants.

The matter of his pacifism even ends up going to court where he must defend himself and his ideals against a jury of his superiors, or get sent to military prison. The pressure does get to his head when a momentary loss of composure forces Desmond to get into a fist fight with the brick wall of his jail cell. He continues to stick to his convictions and show that he can still be helpful on the battlefield even without a gun, in thanks partly to an important piece of information brought to the courtroom by his father.

After the events of the first half have ended, the film gives the viewer very little time to prepare before the bullets start flying. It is actually quite startling, as the violence hits you like a ton of bricks. This is where Gibson really shows that he has still got it. The atmosphere is eerie, quiet at first. As the troops climb the ridge, blood drips from the sky, the scenery shrouded in gray and muted colors, and then the bombs start dropping.

Gibson’s sequences of war violence are some of the best I have ever seen. It is excruciating, thrilling, devastating, fast and visceral. The sequences even rival that of Steven Spielberg’s masterful opening to “Saving Private Ryan.” The attention to detail is impeccable as no piece of the frame is wasted, whether it is filled to the brim with the bodies of soldiers basically running to their deaths or the river of blood that is the result of that. Desmond, on the other hand, is not partaking in the violence and destruction, but frantically searching the mounds of dirt, shrapnel and anonymous bodies for a sign of life.

Even after the attack is over and the American soldiers have withdrawn, Desmond stays back, continuing to search for injured, forgotten men that are still breathing. “Please God, let me save one more,” Desmond prays after each person he rescues. In these scenes, Gibson generates an extreme amount of tension. While the previous scenes of wartime violence packed a more visceral punch, the scenes of Desmond sneaking through the rubble added a welcome helping of suspense. During a scene where he is forced to bury an injured soldier under a layer of dirt to hide him from the enemy patrolling troops is edge-of-your-seat terrifying.

There is a scene where Desmond finds a wounded soldier blindly firing his weapon into the ether. Desmond calms him down and realizes that the soldier cannot see. Desmond then takes his canteen and pours some water over the man’s eyes and the man’s face lights up in a outpouring of emotion and relief. “I thought I was blind,” the man says. At the center of “Hacksaw Ridge,” there is a very crucial message, especially during this day and age. In a world where firearms have become increasingly dangerous as well as increasingly easier to get a hold of due to the political harping about an incredibly outdated constitutional right, this is a film that should be witnessed. “Hacksaw Ridge,” despite its religious themes, never preaches, and gives an answer to the debate over the second amendment. We need more films like it.

-Hacksaw Ridge: 5/5

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These fascinating Netflix movies are based on true events

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Some of the best films of all time are based on stories that are so unique, they could only be based on a true story. In an era marked by the limitless possibilities of fantastical storytelling featuring superheroes and larger-than-life characters, there's a definite allure to films that draw inspiration from real events, offering audiences a grounded perspective on the world as it exists or once existed.

From riveting dramas that chronicle the triumphs and tribulations of remarkable individuals to heartwarming comedies that find humor in the quirks of reality, these are the best movies on Netflix that are based on true stories, ranked.

Former Vice President Dick Cheney doesn’t immediately come across as a compelling subject for a film. However, Vice, from writer-director Adam McKay takes an absurdist tone to the secretive VP’s time as a politician, with moments of Shakespearean dialogue, an end-credits fake-out right in the middle of the movie, and perhaps one of the most jarring fourth wall breaks in recent cinema history. The film stars an almost unrecognizable Christian Bale as Dick Cheney, with Amy Adams, Steve Carell, Sam Rockwell, Justin Kirk, Tyler Perry, Alison Pill, Lily Rabe, and Jesse Plemons rounding out its all-star ensemble cast.

The film may be unorthodox in its approach to the biopic, but it was a hit with critics when it was released in 2018, garnering eight nominations at the Oscars that year, including for Best Picture, Best Director (Adam McKay), and Best Actor (Christian Bale). It may be one of the weirder titles on this list, but you could argue that the life of this cryptic politician was also stranger than fiction, which is why it makes the

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6. Hacksaw Ridge

Andrew Garfield gives a career-defining performance in Hacksaw Ridge as Desmond Doss, a real-life conscientious objector who served as a medic during World War II who refused to carry a weapon. This gripping drama shows how Doss’ beliefs as a Seventh-day Adventist cause his superiors to try and attempt to force him to leave the military.

However, Doss perseveres and plays a critical role at the Battle of Okinawa, particularly the assault on the Maeda Escarpment (also known as "Hacksaw Ridge"), rescuing 75 wounded soldiers under heavy enemy fire, earning him the Medal of Honor, the highest military decoration in the United States.

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The film does not shy away from portraying the brutal and harrowing nature of warfare, but its overall message about the power of peace is one that will deeply resonate with audiences today.

5. Dolemite is my Name

A more traditional biopic, Dolemite is my Name stars Eddie Murphy and is based on the life of Rudy Ray Moore, a comedian, singer, and film producer in the 1970s. Inspired by the stories he hears at a record store, Moore creates the character Dolemite, a flamboyant and raunchy pimp. After debuting the character successfully on stage, Moore is determined to bring him to the silver screen via a blaxploitation film. However, when production issues and a distribution shut-out threaten to derail his plans, Moore takes the future of Dolemite into his own hands, refusing to give up on his dream of bringing the character to life on film.

The film seamlessly blends humor with a heartfelt story, and seeing how the real-life Moore overcame incredible obstacles to bring his vision to movie theaters makes this a hilarious movie that is surprisingly full of heart.

4. The Social Network

You don't get to 500 million friends without making a few enemies.

The tagline from David Fincher’s The Social Network perfectly encapsulates the tone of this film, which chronicles not only the rise of Facebook but also the lengths co-founder Mark Zuckerberg went to keep control of what would become the world’s largest social media platform.

Jesse Eisenberg plays young Mark Zuckerberg, who audiences first meet in the film as a student at Harvard University. The film then goes on to explore the creation of the social media giant, as well as the role that Zuckerberg’s associates Eduardo Saverin (played by Andrew Garfield) and Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss (both played by Armie Hammer) played in its development. The film uses a unique, non-linear structure, which weaves together multiple timelines and legal depositions to underscore just how competitive and cutthroat the creation of Facebook truly was.

3. BlacKKKlansman

Spike Lee’s 2018 movie BlacKKKlansman follows the incredible true story of Ron Stallworth, played by John David Washington, a Black police detective in Colorado Springs, who successfully infiltrated the Ku Klux Klan.

In the film, Stallworth poses as a white supremacist over the phone and uses his Jewish colleague, Flip Zimmerman (played by Adam Driver), to attend Klan meetings in person. Together, they work undercover to expose the Klan's activities and prevent potential acts of violence.

Though the movie takes place in the 1970s, Lee draws sharp parallels to the modern era. The film’s final sequence features an impactful double dolly shot that transports audiences in a way that may be uncomfortable, but hammers home the film’s themes in a very unique and powerful way.

2. The Wolf of Wall Street

Martin Scorcese tackles the excess of the 1990s with The Wolf of Wall Street, which follows the story of Jordan Belfort, a stockbroker who committed massive securities fraud in the 1990s to get obscenely rich very quickly. Leonardo DiCaprio plays Belfort as a cocky, uniquely driven borderline-sociopath who not only tries to convince other characters on screen that he’s the smartest guy in the room, but also the audience as well, through the use of frequent fourth-wall breaks where he addresses them directly.

The film is unflinching in its examination of the culture of greed and excess prevalent on Wall Street not only during the 1990s but in the modern day as well. It also features strong performances from its stacked supporting cast, which includes Margot Robbie, Matthew McCougnahey, and Jonah Hill.

1. The Trial of the Chicago 7

Directed by Aaron Sorkin, 2020’s The Trial of the Chicago 7 is based on the real-life court case that charged a group of seven people with conspiracy related to anti-Vietnam War protests during the 1968 Democratic National Convention in Chicago.

Though primarily a courtroom drama, the film weaves in flashbacks to the events leading up to the protests, providing context for the motivations and actions of the defendants as it shows how a fundamental right as basic as the right to protest was under attack during this time period. Featuring strong performances from an ensemble cast that includes Eddie Redmayne, Sacha Baron Cohen, Mark Rylance, Jeremy Strong, Yahya Abdul-Mateen II, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, and Frank Langella, this film is a stark reminder of the power of free speech, and how it can often come under threat from those tasked with its protection.

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Amanda Kondolojy is an entertainment journalist based in Florida with over 15 years of experience covering film, TV, theme parks and more. When not in front of a screen you can find her reading something at the beach (usually by Neil Gaiman, Grady Hendrix or Brandon Sanderson) or dancing around the kitchen to her favorite showtunes.

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Where To Watch Hacksaw Ridge

T he award-winning film Hacksaw Ridge chronicles the remarkable story of one of America's greatest heroes, and those eager to watch this awe-inspiring tale can find it on a variety of streaming services and VOD platforms. Hacksaw Ridge depicts the true story of Desmond Doss , a faithful advocate of non-violence who believed in serving his country during wartime without compromising his deeply held moral principles. This World War II movie captures audiences' hearts, portraying Doss as an unlikely hero whose pacifist ways had him labeled a coward. The stellar cast features Andrew Garfield as Doss, plus Luke Bracy, Vince Vaughn, and Teresa Palmer.

Directed by Mel Gibson and based on the documentary The Conscientious Objector , Hacksaw Ridge has been hailed for its accuracy by World War II experts. The movie also earned six Academy Award nominations, securing Oscars for Best Film Editing and Best Sound Mixing. The film's stunning cinematography and expert editing skillfully propel the narrative, immersing viewers in the gripping intensity of combat scenes, while offering a raw portrayal of the horrors of war. In the midst of the darkness of World War II, Doss's unwavering heroism shines brightly, making Hacksaw Ridge a profoundly compelling cinematic experience.

Hacksaw Ridge Is Streaming On Netflix

Hacksaw Ridge is currently available to watch on Netflix, for those who have subscriptions to the leading streaming service. Whether one pays for the primary tier of Netflix or the discounted ad-supported level, the movie can be found in the extensive library of content. Hacksaw Ridge is new to Netflix and likely has an expiration date sometime in the near future, so anyone who wants to watch it there should do so sooner rather than later.

Viewer discretion is advised, however. The film has an R rating due to its intense and graphic sequences, vividly depicting the brutality of war. With a total runtime of approximately two hours and 20 minutes, nearly half of the film showcases detailed violence in a World War II setting. Nevertheless, Hacksaw Ridge is a cinematic gem, with powerful messages of resilience and unwavering commitment to one's morals. It is a must-see for anyone with a Netflix subscription.

Related: 10 War Movies Military Experts Praised For Accuracy & Realism

Hacksaw Ridge Is Also Available To Rent & Buy: Platforms & Cost Breakdown

For those without a Netflix subscription, Hacksaw Ridge is readily accessible for rental or purchase through various other platforms. This means there is no need for a Netflix subscription to enjoy this film. To fully appreciate the stunning visuals, opting for an HD or 4K viewing experience might be the optimal choice. Here's a breakdown of the various platforms where viewers can rent or buy Hacksaw Ridge :

Apple TV - $3.99 rental (4k); $12.99 purchase (SD)
Amazon - $3.99 rental (4k); $12.99 purchase (SD)
Google Play - $3.99 rental (4k); $12.99 purchase (SD)
YouTube - $3.99 rental (4k); $12.99 purchase (SD)
VUDU - $3.99 rental (4k); $12.99 purchase (4K)
Microsoft Store - $3.99 rental (HD); $12.99 purchase (HD)
Redbox - $3.99 rental (HD); $12.99 purchase (HD)
Direct TV - $3.99 rental (4k); $12.99 purchase (HD)

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The project has been a hot property going back to when Imagine landed the script and began developing it at the top of the year with every A-list director and star chasing it. Once Guadagnino and Roberts were attached, Amazon moved fast to land the pic and given the star power already involved it’s no surprise top talent like Garfield are now filling out the ensemble.

The Golden Globe and Tony Award-winning actor and Oscar-nominated Garfield who will next be seen in A24 and Studio Canal’s We Live In Time opposite Florence Pugh. Garfield was last seen in FX’s Under the Banner of Heaven , which landed him his first Emmy nomination. Previous credits include Lin-Manuel Miranda’s Tick, Tick… Boom!, Spider-Man: No Way Home , Searchlight’s The Eyes of Tammy Faye , Mel Gibson’s Hacksaw Ridge , Gia Coppola’s Mainstream , David Robert Mitchell’s Under the Silver Lake , Andy Serkis’ Breathe , Martin Scorsese’s Silence opposite Adam Driver, Ramin Bahrani’s 99 Homes , David Fincher’s The Social Network , and Marc Webb’s The Amazing Spider-Man and The Amazing Spider-Man 2 , which combined grossed over $1.5 billion at the box office.

Garfield is represented by Gordon & French, CAA and Sloane, Offer, Weber & Dern.

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Hacksaw Ridge Reviews

Film Review: ‘Hacksaw Ridge’

Owen Gleiberman

Popular on Variety

Reviewed at Venice Film Festival, Sept. 4, 2016. Running time: 131 MIN.

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