Suicide is painless...

[cassiphone]

We watched the movie (as opposed to the tv series) M*A*S*H last night. One of those impulses I've succumbed to since subscribing to Bigpond movies (no more standing aimlessly in Video City for hours

Comments

[stephen_dedman]

It's been several years since I saw the film (whereas I still watch repeats of the TV show occasionally), but I suspect it's probably a more accurate depiction of attitudes, behaviour and conditions during the Korean War. The movie (released in 1970) has much less of an anti-war tone than the TV series (premiering two years later), and I wonder how much of that is due to increasing pessimism and outrage in the U.S. about the Vietnam war over that time.

While I enjoyed the movie, I don't remember anything in it quite as powerful as the final episodes of the TV series.

BTW, one New Scientist subscriber wrote in to say that she was rather alarmed when she called the Samaritans and was put in a queue - and recognized the supposedly soothing music they played while she waited as 'Suicide is Painless'. (Without lyrics, of course.)

[cassiphone]

I agree with Stephen that the movie actually feels less anti-war than the series. I found I was interpreting a lot of the film character's actions through my memories of the series - I knew (or felt) that they were all acting nuts as their way of dealing with the horrors of war, though this is never actually stated or shown in the film. We never see any of the characters affected by the violence, the casualties, the stress of trying to save lives under war conditions, etc. Mostly, we see them affected by the casual (and elaborate) cruelties they inflict upon each other. And we see them rebel against bureaucracy