Old Soldier's Return

By RICHARD SCHICKEL

MacARTHUR

Directed by JOSEPH SARGENT Screenplay by HAL BARWOOD and MATTHEW ROBBINS

There is an awful moment in the middle of this long movie about Douglas MacArthur when one realizes that although the general has finally defeated Japan (with a little help from his friends), he has yet to conduct his model occupation of that country and then fight the Korean War. Much time gone and more yet to go--it is enough to defeat the most ardent military buff. Movie fans more interested in action than in a flatly told, 2 1/2-hour recital of the Great Commander's later life may have long since departed.

MacArthur's troubles stem from what might be virtues in a literary biography--earnestness, caution, balance. Though the moviemakers clearly admire their subject, they are careful, for example, to dramatize his ravening egomania. A staff p.r. man is always present to arrange heroic news photos of the general, and MacArthur's own concern for image is fully laid out. One cannot complain that they have ignored those aspects of MacArthur's nature that his critics deplored. On the other hand, they have not done much with them, which is to say they have tiptoed up to the most fascinating enigma of his character, and then quietly backed away from it.

For let's face it, whether it was an eccentricity or madness, MacArthur's colossal egotism was what made him famous and then, in his fight with Harry Truman over the conduct of his last campaign, brought him down. It was what set him apart from the good gray men like Eisenhower, Marshall and Bradley, those modest servants of the democratic spirit on the battlefield. It made him one of the great characters in our military history. It is the great reason to do a film about him, and it is simply a shame to turn him into a dull fellow onscreen--which he never was in life.

Part of the problem may stem from choosing to confine the movie to World War II and after. While it is clear that it was young Douglas' relationship with his heroic father that shaped his personality, the movie only hints at some of its complexities. Nor does it probe his near mystical feelings for West Point, which obviously provided something that had been missing in his nature until he stepped onto the Plain there. However exaggerated his talk of "The Corps, The Corps, The Corps," of the grandeur he found in the military tradition, there was an authenticity of feeling there that needs to be dug out and explored.

Beyond that, one must regretfully conclude that Gregory Peck is not the ideal choice to play MacArthur. He is a pleasant man, good at playing troubled, conscientious, reasonable characters. But he is perhaps the least self-centered of actors, and while he tries hard to adopt the grand MacArthur manner he just cannot manage it. The fire, the touch of lunacy, is not there, though Peck does nicely in the first and last scenes when he portrays the aged general, flames banked, the mood autumnal.

It is too bad. The controversy that swirled around MacArthur when he lived has mostly died now. He has passed into history, and it would have been good to have a robust life of him: something that really attacked its subject, taking a strong point of view about him -- whether for or against would not have really mattered. The Great Commander never operated in a climate of caution, and there is no good reason why this movie should. Something of the spirit of Patton is what is required. What we get instead is the plodding tone of an official biography.

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