Red Tails is a film that has been George Lucas’s passion project for the past two decades. The problem with passion projects is that they can be hard to finance. The other issue inherent with making a passion project like Red Tails is that it stars an all African-American cast, and studio executives don’t believe that a film with minorities as the main characters can appeal to an international audience.
Red Tails is the story of the Tuskegee Airmen who had to fight segregation in World War II because society did not want to accept them as true fighter pilots. The fighter pilots that are essential to the story of Red Tails are Marty “Easy” Julian and Joe “Lightning” Little. Joe and Julian are best friends and the film is, in essence, the story of their group’s determination to become accepted. Red Tails is a fine example of what it means to have an ensemble cast. No one actor plays a lead role in Red Tails. Each actor turns in a unique performance that adds to the story, rather than having any standout leads. Cuba Gooding Jr, Terance Howard, Bryan Cranston, Ne-Yo, and Tristian Wilds all have important roles in the film.
My problem with Red Tails, however, is with the personalities of the characters. All of them are stereotypes that we’ve seen in other military movies. Some of the archetypes include: the pilot with drinking problem, the pilot who’s viewed as “the kid,” and the impulsive pilot who constantly puts himself in danger. Because the characters are so one-dimensional, it’s almost impossible to find someone to root for. I wanted to care about these characters and their struggles, but the childish dialogue and their actions made them seem not only immature, but also unintelligent. I love stories about overcoming obstacles and challenging perceptions on race, but the experiences depicted in this film only focus on the anger and disappointment the pilots felt because they were not given actual missions. While I can see the undertone of the Tuskegee airmen not being respected by the air force, I would have liked to have seen that group of men struggle in more diverse ways.
Another problem with Red Tails is its setting. The majority of the film takes place in Italy in 1948. There’s not much room to tell a story about oppression in Italy, which looks exactly like any tourist would expect. The environments are picturesque and the local people are friendly. The only opposition Joe and Julian face — other than the Germans — are the white fighter pilots who don’t respect them.
The film feels unfocused at times because it’s trying to emotionally invest the audience, but the situations these pilots are placed in — while extremely difficult and unrewarding — give us no reason to root for the characters. An example where characters actually emotionally connect with an audience can be found in last year’s The Help, when Aibileen Clark lectures Hilly Holbrook towards the end of the film because Hilly is a horrible parent. Red Tails makes no real attempt to deeply connect with the audience. Instead, Lucas and his director Anthony Hemmingway paint Red Tails as a by-the-numbers period piece. Any depth about the actual achievements of the Tuskegee Airmen will only be found just before the end credits, and that’s of very little use to those who viewed the film.
Red Tails attempts to fly high, but crashes after takeoff due to poor character development and no focus on how the airmen conquered the oppression they faced, beyond the dogfights they survived during the war.
Two Stars.
Red Tails can currently be seen at Savoy 16 and Carmike Cinema’s The Beverly.