Filmmaker and former Marine JD Johannes is selling a compilation DVD called Outside the Wire on his website. The DVD contains three short documentaries that Johannes shot himself whilst embedded with troops in Iraq (a trailer is embedded above). On a blog on the site, Johannes positions his “pro-victory, pro-troop” films in opposition to docs like Body of War and The Ground Truth. “Actually going to Iraq, living down in the dirt with the grunts and making documentaries about what is happening on the ground appears to be a rather novel concept, but I think the best way to understand Iraq is to see it from 5′10″ off the ground,” he writes.
Fair enough. But wait––there’s a gimmick! Johannes is trying to sell 2,900 copies of his DVD in six weeks, in order to match the domestic box office gross of Brian DePalma’s fall flop Redacted.
I haven’t seen Johannes’ movies, and I’m certainly not opposed to as many views of the war as possible getting out into the market place. In fact, I’ve argued previously that the reason why films like Lions For Lambs and Stop-Loss are so disappointing creatively and commercially is due to a homogeneity of perspective––the anti-war choir really doesn’t need to be pandered to anymore.
But what is a little illogical to me is that Johannes has chosen Redacted as the target to beat. Redacted, a film widely panned by critics and pundits from all points on the political spectrum. Redacted, whose box office gross was potentially diluted by its day-and-date release on VOD and DVD. Redacted, instead of an actual documentary, such as Iraq in Fragments (also shot independently, by a cameraman/director, on the streets of Iraq) or Taxi to the Dark Side or The War Tapes (which, to my mind, is as honest a documentary about troops on the ground in Iraq as is conceivable, being that it was shot by the troops themselves), all of which grossed many times more than Redacted’s pitiful $65k domestic.
Isn’t this setting the bar a bit low? I don’t argue that grossing $65k through direct DVD sales would be a victory for the usual independent filmmaker, but Johannes has higher aspirations. “My thesis is this: If it can be demonstrated that a pro-troop, pro-victory documentary can succeed in the market place by beating the domestic box office gross of an anti-war film like Redacted the money loving side of Hollywood will back a pro-troop movie.” I wish him luck in his endeavors (after about three weeks, he’s 34% of the way to his goal, according to the “Beat Hollywood!” graph on the sidebar of his site). I just don’t see how “beating” Redacted––a film no one in Hollywood or elsewhere was impressed with––will make much of an impression.
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