Though sometimes disjointed, The Inspection does an excellent job of conveying the myriad of emotions and experiences of its lead character.
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Movies have a strange relationship with the military. On the one end, movies, especially American movies, like to deify soldiers as paragons of virtue or whatever other values we as a culture like to prop including (but not limited to):
- Proficiency in combat
- Self-sacrifice for the greater good
- Courage in the face of great danger
- Defenders of the nation and each other
That said, there's also no shortage of movies that portray war, soldiers and combat as a literal and moral meat-grinder that turns young men into violent killers or forces them to die and go into harm's way for no apparent reason. That's how you get Rambo movies on one side and on the other side every war movie Stanley Kubrick ever made including Paths of Glory and Full Metal Jacket.
Which is why this personal story, about a homeless gay youth who joins the Marines, stands out.
The Setup
The movie follows Ellis French, a young gay man who is struggling while living on the street. Hoping for regular room and board, French enlists in the Marines and ends up at a punishing boot camp in South Carolina. But when Ellis' attempts to fly under the radar are almost immediately foiled, French will have to find unlikely allies and resolve to survive the training, literally and figuratively.
One thing you should know about this movie right out of the gate, is that it takes place during the "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" period within the American military. For those unfamiliar, this was a compromise that made everyone mad in nineties, that allowed queer people to serve in the military provided that they didn't do anything to out themselves, with the implied agreement from military leaders that they wouldn't remove anyone they suspected of being gay. Bigots didn't like it because it meant gay people could enter the military and didn't have to identify themselves. Advocates for gay/queer rights didn't like it because it was forcing people in a high pressure situation to present as straight and remain closeted. This was eventually reversed in 2011.
This is important to note because it means that:
- There's going to be a lot of blatant homophobia and slurs used throughout the film.
- Ellis' main tension within boot camp is being "discovered" or pushed out due to his sexual orientation, not a lack of physical ability.
There's just one problem, everyone seems to know and as such Ellis becomes a target for a fellow recruit and his drill instructor. This is all devastatingly conveyed by Jeremy Pope, who says so much with his eyes throughout this movie it's absurd. You can tell he's furious, hurt but also that...he doesn't have any other options. So he has to either bend or break to get through.
Now I'll be quick to note that this movie doesn't offer a lot of direct commentary on homophobia or the military as a whole. My guess is that because this is a close recreation of writer/director Elegance Bratton's own experience, the focus is on conveying feelings and circumstances rather than saying one thing really loudly.
Which includes:
The Limits of Support
One of the difficulties Ellis runs into right away is finding allies. The power dynamic at boot camp means that the drill-instructor Laws (played to menacing perfection by Bokeem Woodbine), runs the camp with an iron fist and there's only a handful of other officers who have somewhat equal footing. The other recruits don't want to challenge the head man and the one ally Ellis does have, another officer named Rosales, is very careful about when he agrees to say something because he knows it could impact his career. This means that outside help (i.e. officers who have nothing to do with Laws) are often Ellis best bet when things get very bad or Ellis has to find a way to power through on his own.
It's an unfortunate demonstration of how and why the power dynamics within the military can get abused, especially when the instructor does nothing to stop a fellow recruit from homophobic harassment of Ellis.
Why Laws Harasses Ellis
At first glance, you'll probably assume that Laws is trying to take out Ellis because he's gay and that he himself is homophobic. And while that second part is definitely true to LARGEe extent (the language choices are all too telling), Laws also seems to have this "crucible of combat" belief that guides his thinking. Without getting too spoilery, Laws seems to view pushing Ellis to become more violent, aggressive and competent through harassment as forging him into a great soldier (i.e. if he can survive what I'm putting him through he can survive anything). Forget the fact that the world has treated Ellis so bad and that perhaps he would want to feel supported by his fellow soldiers. We're not here to support. We're here to break young men and forge them into weapons. It's a telling look into a very military and conservative mindset, that struggle and pain are what forges someone into something better and stronger.
Solidarity...Eventually
As bad as everything is, the battle that Ellis is waging is to find a place where he is...accepted is too strong of a word. Tolerated and supported is a better idea. So even though accepting gay allies are hard to come by, there is an unspoken solidarity that comes from being a soldier and getting through boot camp. Whether it's shared trauma or bonding for the wrong reasons, it's still clearly more than Ellis has had elsewhere in his life.
The Verdict: Rough, But Fascinating
Though sometimes disjointed, The Inspection does an excellent job of conveying the myriad of emotions and experiences of its lead character. 7/10
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