Memorial Day Films 2012

Best Years of Our Lives (1946) Rated NR

Recounts the problems faced by three returning veterans of WWII as they attempt to pick up the threads of their lives. Captain Derry is returning to a loveless marriage, Sergeant Stephenson is a stranger to a family that’s grown up without him, and sailor Parrish is tormented by the loss of his hands.

Saving Private Ryan (1998) Rated R

Captain John Miller must take his men behind enemy lines to find Private Ryan, whose three brothers have been killed in combat. Faced with impossible odds, the men question their orders. Why are eight men risking their lives to save just one? Surrounded by the brutal realities of war, each man searches for his own answer and the strength to triumph over uncertain future with honor, decency and courage.

Platoon (1986) Rated R

Follows young Chris Taylor who arrives in Vietman and quickly discovers that his worst enemies are not just the Viet Cong, but gnawing fear, physical exhaustion, and the anger growing within himself.

All Quiet on the Western Front (1930) Rated NR

A group of young World War I German recruits pass from idealism to disillusionment with war.

Paths of Glory (1957) Rated NR

The French General Staff, safely behind the lines, sends orders for what amounts to a suicide mission. To cover up their fatal blunder, three soldiers are arrested and made scapegoats. Dax, a lawyer in civilian life, rises to the men’s defense but soon realizes that, unless he can prove that the Generals were to blame, nothing less than a miracle will save his clients from the firing squad.

PageTurners Read “Hart’s War”

Hart’s War
by John Katzenbach
World War II was racially segregated, the lowliest jobs going to African American GIs. A distinguished few called the Tuskegee Airmen, however, became officers in the U.S. Air Force, escorting bombers in their lethal new longrange Mustang fighters. When proud, defiant First Lieutenant Lincoln Scott arrives at Stalag Luft Thirteen, he is subjected to hostile treatment by bigoted airmen who refuse to acknowledge that any black man can equal them in skill and courage. Scott’s persistent tormentor, Captain Vincent Befford, is soon found murdered. Honor, courage, and sacrifice are revealed in unexpected ways as a ranking U.S. prisoner in a Nazi POW camp is joined in December 1944 by a law-student lieutenant who’d been captured despite his father’s powerful military connections. When First Lieutenant Lincoln Scott is falsely accused of murdering fellow prisoner, Captain Vincent Befford, Second Lieutenant Tommy Hart, the only prisoner with any legal training, is appointed to defend him in a formal military trial observed by top- ranking German officers, who will furnish the firing squad when the defendant is almost certainly convicted.

The PageTurners Book Club met on Thursday, May 3, at 6 pm in the Bottom Shelf Room at the Rice Lake Public Library. Six people attended the discussion. The general consensus about the book was that it started slow but became more enjoyable once the mystery began. Several participants watched the movie in lieu of reading the book; it was agreed that the movie differed substantially from the book. The average score awarded to this book was  3.75 out of 5 books; the lowest score was a 3.5 / 5 and the highest score 4 / 5.

Click on the book graphic below to see a full recap of book club members’ opinions.

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Hart’s War by John Katzenbach is available at the Rice Lake Public Library. There over ten copies of this book in the MORE System. Please visit the card catalog website or call us at 234-4861 to reserve a copy today.