Director JM Harper’s look into the six-man recon teams in the Vietnam War in the documentary Soul Patrol.
The Black experience in War has been covered enough. Not in the News, Books, or Films. Director JM Harper’s documentary Soul Patrol looks at the Black Soldier experience through the eyes of the men of the 51st Infantry of the United States Army during the Vietnam War. Harper’s film focuses on five men apart of a LRP or Long-Range Reconnaissance Patrol group and their lives before, during, and after their war. Emanuel, Brock, Mackey, Reid, and Mattox all enlist (rather than being drafted) at the very height of the civil rights movement in 1968. The men find unexpected camaraderie and solace within their small group between tense standoffs and firefights.
Soul Patrol, a film based in part on Ed Emanuel’s biography of the same name focusing on his tour in Vietnam (from 1968 – 1969), uses the 50th Anniversary of the war and these men’s reunion as the framework and the beating heart of the film. As much as the film is an elegy to these men’s forgotten time in the most harrowing of experiences often by a government who refused to admit their heroics and sacrifice speaks to the larger experience of many men.
The film is exquisitely edited by Byron Leon (along with Harper, Gabriela Tessitore and Niles Howard), constructed using interviews, footage from the war, actual Super 8 footage shot by the soldiers, photos, and cultural TV/Stock footage of the era to create a pastiche and feeling of the time and space for these men. Harper does push his documentary into some lovely narrative areas with scenes that give us fictional looks at the soldiers’ time in the past and how it has haunted them in the present. This is where Harper’s film shines, allowing his film to go beyond the documentary format but not so much as to corrupt it, but rather enhance it.
Soul Patrol is a stirring emotional look at the hardship of war and how, through story and history, we can heal and come to terms with the darkest times in our lives. A vital film that should not be missed.
Director JM Harper’s look into the six-man recon teams in the Vietnam War in the documentary Soul Patrol.
The Black experience in War has been covered enough. Not in the News, Books, or Films. Director JM Harper’s documentary Soul Patrol looks at the Black Soldier experience through the eyes of the men of the 51st Infantry of the United States Army during the Vietnam War. Harper’s film focuses on five men apart of a LRP or Long-Range Reconnaissance Patrol group and their lives before, during, and after their war. Emanuel, Brock, Mackey, Reid, and Mattox all enlist (rather than being drafted) at the very height of the civil rights movement in 1968. The men find unexpected camaraderie and solace within their small group between tense standoffs and firefights.
Soul Patrol, a film based in part on Ed Emanuel’s biography of the same name focusing on his tour in Vietnam (from 1968 – 1969), uses the 50th Anniversary of the war and these men’s reunion as the framework and the beating heart of the film. As much as the film is an elegy to these men’s forgotten time in the most harrowing of experiences often by a government who refused to admit their heroics and sacrifice speaks to the larger experience of many men.
The film is exquisitely edited by Byron Leon (along with Harper, Gabriela Tessitore and Niles Howard), constructed using interviews, footage from the war, actual Super 8 footage shot by the soldiers, photos, and cultural TV/Stock footage of the era to create a pastiche and feeling of the time and space for these men. Harper does push his documentary into some lovely narrative areas with scenes that give us fictional looks at the soldiers’ time in the past and how it has haunted them in the present. This is where Harper’s film shines, allowing his film to go beyond the documentary format but not so much as to corrupt it, but rather enhance it.
Soul Patrol is a stirring emotional look at the hardship of war and how, through story and history, we can heal and come to terms with the darkest times in our lives. A vital film that should not be missed.
Soul Patrol is only in theaters on November 6th; click here for a full listing of play dates.
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