This film shows that Tropic Thunder wasn’t a parody of Hollywood, but a prophecy of what’s to come. Hacksaw Ridge is ridiculously overwrought and madly in love with depicting gruesome image after gruesome image of war. Characters are the flat, stereotypical grouping of soldiers that seem mandated in Hollywood’s version of war. Pretty boy, Brooklyn Italian, corn fed Midwesterner… Blah, blah, blah. Vince Vaughn is so over the top as a drill sergeant (who then deploys with them… I’m no military historian, but huh?) that he seems like he’s in on the joke. Maybe he was. The story revolves around conscientious objector Desmond Doss who fights with the Army to allow him into battle and ultimately saved 75 men and was the first CO to receive the Congressional Medal of Honor. This is a meaningful story. But if Gibson didn’t ruin it with a constant waterfall of burning bodies, blown off limbs, and eviscerations, Andrew Garfield’s portrayal of Doss certainly would have. I’m reminded of Robert Downey, Jr.’s lecture (in full black face) to Ben Stiller in Tropic Thunder, “Everybody knows you never go full retard.” As offensive as it sounds, the film is a perfect satire of Hollywood, particularly in the context of a war film. I guess Garfield never saw it. He fails to portray Doss as a complicated man following his faith and instead gives him an air of mental handicap that collapses the film wholly. The moral and intellectual fortitude of a conscientious objector who continually charged into battle to save his comrades is a complex and interesting topic worthy of discussion, but Garfield’s portrayal makes Doss into a simpleton who either didn’t know any better or blindly followed faith. Hacksaw Ridge is a self-involved gore fest that fails fully.