Flags of our Fathers is more than a war film. While filled with open wounds, decapitated heads, and other gruesome realities of the battle, it's a film about political exploitation at its worst. The sometimes-jarring story changes to tell multiple levels of a complicated tale, each leading in the same direction as the film progresses.

Fathers gets off to a rough start. The viewer is immediately pushed into three separate plot threads in a matter of minutes, then pushed into flashback, then to the war, and finally to modern times. While difficult to follow, the narrative pulls itself together into a coherent piece that truly covers all aspects of war.

The trademark here is undoubtedly the epic and sustained landing of American troops on Iwo Jima. It's filled with visual effects, brutal death, explosions, and loads of gunfire. This nearly 20-minute long sequence could be enough to carry the film on its own.

That's not the focus here though. The film focuses on events which take place after this struggle pertaining to three survivors who were unfortunately photographed in an inspiring picture hoisting the American flag. Paraded around almost like circus animals, the government barely lets them sleep in an effort to sell war bonds.

The three actors used to portray the men in the picture (Ryan Phillippe, Jesse Bradford, Adam Beach) are wonderfully developed and unique. The film falters when the story falls back onto the Iwo Jima battle, losing these three men to a host of others who barely have their names spoken in the film, let alone any history or background information.

It gets worse when the film shifts to modern times as a soldiers son interviews the surviving members of the "Heroes of Iwo Jima." This entire storyline is unnecessary and convolutes the film with a third unnecessary arc. Fathers is actually told from this perspective, yet without it, this would be a far tighter film as a whole and still work as a narrative.

Still, this is a true masterpiece of war films. It has few moments of happiness, and those brief flashes rapidly come to an end as a man is accidentally sent overboard to his death. The troops brief flashes of laughter at the soldiers misfortune signals the end of any joking around when they realize he won't be saved. It's completely focused on the sheer loss of life from that moment on when on the island.