Flags of Our Fathers

James Bradley’s book (written with Ron Powers) about his father, Navy corpsman John Bradley, and the five other men in the famous photograph of the flag-raising on Iwo Jima, comes to the screen, concisely scripted by William Broyles Jr. and Paul Haggis and directed with epic authority by Clint Eastwood. The movie follows the three survivors of the picture (the others were dead within days) through a bond drive designed to bolster home-front morale during the darkest days of World War II; as each man tries to cope with the hype of the tour, compounded by haunted guilt over the buddies left behind to continue the fighting, the movie etches in bold flashes the immense cost and long-lingering effects of the war. Ryan Phillippe, Jesse Bradford and Adam Beach play the three men, heading a strong ensemble cast.