Wounds of war are exposed in this portrait of a military family
Father, Soldier, Son 15 cert, 99 min
★★★★★
Dirs Catrin Einhorn, Leslye Davis
In most documentaries, we catch the drift early on: the shape and message of the film pre-announce themselves. This scenario is impossible with Father, Soldier, Son, portrait of an American military family which two journalists, Catrin Einhorn and Leslye Davis, began shooting in 2010. Lives change over any decade: there’s no way of guessing where this film will lead us, and a typical story arc can’t be taken for granted.
Brian Eisch is returning from a tour in Afghanistan as the film starts, and we’re shown his tearful reunion with his two young sons – 12-year-old Isaac and Joey, seven – whom he has been raising as a single divorcé. During his six-month deployment, the boys have been entrusted to family members, but his absences have weighed on them dreadfully, and when Isaac learns his father has a serious leg wound, he admits to a relief that dad’s back for good.
Four years later, the leg hasn’t healed, and must be amputated. This is as far along in the Eisch family saga as factual spoilers might be permitted, beyond the addition of a new mum into their midst – Brian’s girlfriend Maria, who has older children who’ve left the nest, and one of Joey’s age. The focus is equally on the challenges of Brian’s disability, the steep slope to feeling in charge of his life again, and the effects of his ordeal on the boys’ psychology, which is the material that fascinates most.
Isaac, at 16, has poured his energies into helping his dad, but can’t really imagine the same career path. He doesn’t want his kids to suffer the same childhoods: you can tell he ponders whether the family’s sacrifice has truly been worth it, a thought that even troubles Brian on darker days.
Isaac vows to go to college and then enrol in the police force, thereby breaking from a four-generationstrong Eisch tradition of military service. Without openly opposing him, Brian can’t see it happening. And in Joey he has a plucky miniature cadet in the making, whose patriotism is only increased by the desire to avenge his dad’s injury. He’s a small kid – overpowered easily on the wrestling mat – whose desperation to measure up feels touchingly immature. The filmmakers ably illustrate how the baton gets passed down: Brian and Joey are gamers who love blowing things to bits. A movie outing to American Sniper catches them cooing at the big toys on screen. But Isaac sits apart, more quietly, and you can sense doubt and disillusionment lapping away at him.
There are gruelling twists awaiting the Eisches, and some terrific shotmaking. In its outcomes and politics, this film is almost begging to be oversimplified, but it’s well worth staying on the alert for the ironies, the complexities, and the tacit questions it finds a host of ways to express.
It never hammers us with statements, even if the emotional payload is huge, and we’re always wondering what wake-up call it might take – for a certain breed of bullish hereditary machismo to falter, slip and mutate between the generations.