Watch The Thin Red Line For Free

That was an excellent one.

I wanted to but couldn't!

It's the kind of movie you'll want to see a second time with someone who hasn't seen it yet, to remember what it was like to watch it for the first time.

It’s not bad or unwatchable but despite the amplitude of the spectacle, the end result is underwhelming.

I just watched the movie for the second time (first was many years ago), and came to see the comments...It seems there are mostly 2 sides: one that got deeply moved and thought-provoked by it, and others who watched it only to see what the hype is about and find flaws...For me, this is one of the movies that influences your perspective on live and through which you uncover another small bit of realization about the human nature...If you're looking for an action, war movie, you won't find it here - it will be too long and too philosophical. If you're looking for something "deep" but which will be fully defined, chewed up and served to you, you'll probably find it "pretentious and egoistical" like some of the comments here.But if you let yourself into it without pre-set expectations and opinion, take in all that is going on and let your thoughts dig a bit into some of the directions, you'll find a masterfully created art that takes a period of time and a location and just shows it to you, along with people in it, from multiple angles, not telling you what to think. Then you are, at the same time, exposed to the beauty and duality of nature (tranquility and violence), men which are a part of it, that are conflicted by that same duality, to their (most often) disconnected thoughts while they are trying to make sense of things that are happening and the essence of it ("What is killing us?", "What's keepin' us from reaching out, touching the glory?")...There are no good guys or bad guys, no heros nor villains, no conclusions or answers, no story (in traditional sense) - and it's still one of the most effective, daring and influential anti-war movies ever...If you want to, you will find plenty of topics in the movie (nature, temporality and relative insignificance of man and his conflict's and goals, free will, love, morality, idealism, death, God, goodness, survival...) and lots of symbolism, but never forced upon you...If you want to see a movie primarily as form of entertainment, this is probably not a best choice. But if you want to be exposed to art, as in - a creation that will provoke heavier emotions, change your mood, make you think your own thoughts and keep you "submerged" in it for a bit longer - this is one of those that truly belongs in that category.

In the 1970's Terrence Malick's directorial debut "Badlands", and 5 years later "days of heaven" established him as a fresh, unique voice in a decade that produced a new generation of film makers. Both offerings were both powerful and visually beautiful, and then, he disappeared for twenty years.... He returned to direct one of the greatest war films of all time. No The Thin Red Line does not have a typical story line, but neither does life, and that is what Malick captures and expresses in Red Line so honest and eloquently. Rather than the typical Hollywood plot arc, Malick instead focuses on the conflict, love, and fear the characters are going thru at that moment in time, and in relation to the war. It saddens me but does not surprise me that there are people who don't get Thin Line. Thankfully both critics in the states and around the world both "got" Thin Line, and also often considered it to be the best film of the decade. War is a traumatic experience, and Malick captures that with the honest narration that threads throughout the film. He exposes the characters with their inner narrations, offering the viewer a deeper, and more vulnerable portrait than is usually depicted in typical war films. In many ways it's more a profound character film with the backdrop of war secondary, serving as a setting to explore these characters. Never have I seen a film, or director who better explores the human character so honestly as Malick. That combined with the stunning choreography makes for a unique and beautiful cinematic experience. It's my guess that the people who don't get this film or Malick, are probably also the people who don't get life on a deeper and more honest level.

"The Thin Red Line," being released so close to "Saving Private Ryan", is destined to be called "that other war movie of 1998." This is very unfortunate and definitely very wrong. For, "The Thin Red Line" is not just another brutal war movie. It is a visual and thematic masterpiece. In any other year, this would've probably been the highlight, rather than being dubbed as an imitation of Spielberg's war-epic.For sure, "The Thin Red Line" is not as disturbing to watch as "Saving Private Ryan" is. Even though, this film capture the war- genre more accurately. It is a complete fiction, (so is Saving Private Ryan) but at least this one is more true to the horrors of warfare. Though not as nearly as graphic, the directing seems to produce a very suspenseful and uncomfortable connection to the battles at hand. Thus, be warned that parts of this movie can be very hard to watch, and are certainly not for everyone. The violence at least is not an end in itself, and serves to illustrate the sacrifice and madness young men endured in WWII to fight for our freedom. In these respects, "The Thin Red Line" is similar to "Saving Private Ryan". One might well ask why watch two such gruesome features in one year?The actors in "The Thin Red Line" are making one movie, and the director is making another. This leads to an almost hallucinatory sense of displacement, as the actors struggle for realism, and the movie's point of view hovers above them like a high school kid all filled with big questions. My guess is that any veteran of the actual battle of Guadalcanal would describe this movie with an eight-letter word much beloved in the Army.The bigger problem which will come to mind when people seen it in recent years: the voice-overs of the characters' thoughts. The problem is that not one of these voice-overs is realistic in the least. They all seem to be written by the same poet or philosopher who has never actually been to war, but has seen a couple good war movies and read a few war novels. He is thinking in the style of "The Grand Poetry of War," which is sharply at odds with everything that is happening on screen. Their thoughts are not real, nor do they seem to be real; they are obvious fabrications meant to manipulate us into thinking of war in romantic terms. The language is beautiful, and the metaphors accurately describe the horrors of war. But unless the company shown in the movie is made up completely of Yale English professors, the voice-overs feel far removed from the individual thinking the thoughts. On the other hand, the Japanese throughout are totally depersonalised (in crucial scenes, their language is not even translated with subtitles); seen as enemies so much as necessary antagonists--an expression of nature's compulsion to "contend with itself."Sidebar: "Saving Private Ryan" wins in terms of scary scenes, but nothing like the constant terror seen in the eyes of Malick's actors. And they all manage to do this with a relatively small amount of screen-time.

This movie was not only incredibly boring, it rubs your face in boredom, it enshrines it. And it just never ends! If you enjoy languorously gorgeous shots of jungle foliage for extended periods of time, masquerading as plot; if you enjoy watching self-indulgent directors slide into parody, you'll love this thing. There is one really excellent battle scene, but that's hardly worth the cinematic torture one must endure, hoping something will happen.