MOSUL, Iraq, Insur gency City: “It’s pretty nice,” says one soldier. “I mean, I wouldn’t buy no summer home here.”
“Brothers at War” would be interesting enough if it merely observed soldiers in their element as they chill behind friendly lines — there’s a glimpse of a DVD of “The Dirty Dozen” and a shot of a paperback copy of “Catch-22,” its cover flapping in the breeze — but this documentary, which begins at a low key, gradually becomes intense and psychologically complicated.
Filmmaker Jake Rademacher is a double embed, exploring the Iraq war from within the firefights and within his family. Two of his brothers have served there: Isaac is a West Point-trained officer, while the younger Joe is a Ranger and a sniper.
Cheerful in his cluelessness, Jake visits the squared-away Isaac and goes (without him) on a reconnaissance mission near the Syrian border. Nothing much happens, but Jake is good-humored about his softness. When he asks Isaac, “What was it like to see me jump off the Humvee?” the reply is, “I think it was a lot more exciting for you than it was for me.” At another point Jake is caught asking trained death dealers, “Private Benjamin”-ishly, “When do you put on sunscreen?”
Back home after three weeks, Jake discovers that Joe is unimpressed. So he goes back, and this time he’s determined to find action — for no other reason than to earn his kid brother’s respect. Jake goes on door-to-door patrols, camps out on a city rooftop with some snipers (who take out their target with a single shot) and films an IED blast just a few yards ahead of where he’s running. A firefight explodes around him.
The film is frank about the psychological consequences of war (Joe’s girlfriend says battle has changed him, and she seems damaged herself: “Finally, it’s like I’m just happy again. Then he leaves.”) and the disorienting jolt of losing a friend in battle. But it also takes in much more of the spectrum than most of the Iraq war movies. Many of these are shaped not to provide a portrait but to nudge (push, shove) the audience in an anti-war direction. (Two strong exceptions are HBO’s “Generation Kill” and “The War Tapes.”)
The troops in “Brothers at War” are dedicated professionals, but they are also thrill junkies who believe “You have to have organized chaos” and that kills are “like a tattoo”: Once you’ve got one, you want another. They’re furious when one of them is cut down, and they’re obsessed with TV’s “The OC.” The Iraqi soldiers they train are getting better — but still look timid and uninvolved, as if they’d much rather be home in front of the TV.
As his viewers are bound to be, Jake is frankly admiring of what the troops go through, and why. “I’d give my life for America any day,” says one soldier. “Wouldn’t think twice.”
BROTHERS AT WAR
Good to go.
Running time: 110 minutes. Rated R (profanity, war violence). At the Loews Village, Third Avenue and 11th Street.