War movies are a dime a dozen here in the U.S., feeding our thirst for violence while portraying it in a heroic light. What's rare is to find an American war movie that is both shot entirely on another continent, but also has a hero who refuses to fight. And that's what Mel Gibson is bringing to the table with his new directorial effort, Hacksaw Ridge, starring Andrew Garfield as conscientious objector, Desmond Doss.
The first trailer has arrived for what many believe is Gibson's comeback, and it has the awards season release date to go along with those expectations. Garfield plays Doss, a pacifist during WWII who still managed to earn the Congressional Medal of Honor for his heroic activities on the battlefield. Like two of Gibson's earlier films, Braveheart and The Passion of the Christ, the brutality is front and center whether Doss ever fires a shot or not. Here's the synopsis:
HACKSAW RIDGE is the extraordinary true story of conscientious collaborator Desmond Doss [Andrew Garfield] who, in Okinawa during the bloodiest battle of WWII, saved 75 men without firing or carrying a gun. He believed the war was just, but killing was nevertheless wrong; he was the only American soldier in WWII to fight on the front lines without a weapon. As an army medic, Doss single-handedly evacuated the wounded from behind enemy lines, braved fire while tending to soldiers and was wounded by a grenade and hit by s
Also starring Vince Vaughn, Hugo Weaving, Richard Roxburgh, Rachel Griffiths, Teresa Palmer, Luke Bracey, and Sam Worthington, Hacksaw Ridge opens November 4th.
