To See If I'm Smiling (2007) User Reviews

Re: Sentimental Bunk

[jgrogan-3 · 8/10 · 18 June 2009]

I don't know what film you watched but it doesn't appear that you watched this one very closely.

Of course this film is not about war. It's not a war film, nor is it a film about the occupation of Palestine though the conflict there forms the backdrop of the film. It neither glamorizes, justifies nor excuses any of the events that happen in the Occupied Territories. And there is no political context alluded to this film because this film is, I think, very deliberately apolitical. The film makers display no overt bias one way or the other. And in so doing, one is allowed to take their own meaning from the film.

That said it's pretty obvious to me that the occupation of Palestine not only diminishes the humanity of Palestinians but also that of the occupiers. The line between justifiable self preservation and unwarranted sadism is proved to be very thin.

The subjects in the film don't speak politically and they don't resort to easy rhetoric. It shows that it is extremely difficult to do the "right thing", what can happen if you try to and ultimately the great psychological price one pays for having to leave one's moral compass to one side.

Highly recommended if uncomfortable viewing

interview documentary about six or seven girls in Israeli military service

[mennogaijkema · 8/10 · 24 December 2007]

This is a very moving interview documentary about six or seven girls who were drafted in Israeli military service. They tell about what they did, saw and heard, and about what they should have done. It's nothing different from other war stories - which is all the worse. It made me think again about what people did in ... (Iraq, Afghanistan, Vietnam, Indonesia etc etc.)

The stories themselves of course are subjective, but it's all presented very matter-of-fact. Almost no tears, no one 's good or bad -this is just what happens when people get into war.

The title is connected to one of the girls' story; she's very ashamed about her having a picture taken next to the body of a dead 'enemy' and she wants to see the picture.. to see if she smiles.

More information

[SipteaHighTea · 9/10 · 6 March 2010]

There should have been information about the number of mental casualties that Israel has due to its occupation and the fighting in southern Lebanon.

I watched a five part series on the History Channel in 1997 about the SS. One part was about the Waffen SS. One SS soldier fought in the 1940 French Campaign, and he stated when the fighting was over, his comrades drank heavily for 3 days straight. The producers also found a film taken by one of the SS soldiers showing a bunch of SS sergeants being in a drunken state.

It doesn't matter what uniform you wear and what country you are serving in: War changes you as the defense lawyer in the movie Breaker Morant pointed out where the normal everyday life has totally been replaced by the constant round of fear, anger, blood, and death. In the final episode of MASH, Major Charles Winchester stated that he play music to escape from war; however, because due to the death of Chinese POWS that he taught how to play music, Winchester stated that music will remind him of the war. The female medical officer in the movie To See If I'm Smiling ask the question at the end of the movie how do you get rid of what you had experience?