François Truffaut? Sam Mendes? Steven Spielberg? Gene Siskel? Roger Ebert? Apocryphal?
Question for Quote Investigator: The excitement, violence, and brutality of films about war often causes confusion in the minds of movie goers. Even when a director’s avowed stance is anti-war the visceral reaction of viewers might be very different. A prominent director once said something like the following. Here are three versions:
(1) I don’t think I’ve really seen an antiwar film. Every film about war ends up being pro-war.
(2) There is no such thing as an anti-war film, because all war films look exciting.
(3) It is impossible to make an “anti-war film,” because any war film, no matter what its message, is sure to be exhilarating.
This notion has been attributed to French New Wave director François Truffaut, but I am skeptical because I have never seen a solid citation. Would you please explore this topic?
Reply from Quote Investigator: In 1973 U.S. film critic Gene Siskel interviewed François Truffaut, and Siskel asked about the use of violence in the Truffaut’s films:1
Q.—There’s very little killing in your films. How come?
A.—I find that violence is very ambiguous in movies. For example, some films claim to be antiwar, but I don’t think I’ve really seen an antiwar film. Every film about war ends up being pro-war.
Q.—Even a film like Kubrick’s “Paths of Glory” or his “Dr. Strangelove”?
A.—Yes, I think Kubrick likes violence very much.
After contemplation Siskel found credence in Truffaut’s perspective:
I have thought about Truffaut’s point for the last two weeks, and only now am I beginning to understand and agree with him. In “Paths of Glory,” which so many people consider the strongest antiwar film ever made, the film doesn’t so much condemn war as the French government that thought it necessary to sacrifice its soldiers.
The citation above is the only direct evidence of a statement from Truffaut located by QI at this time. Many other statements have been attributed to Truffaut without support.
Below are additional selected citations in chronological order.
In 1971 U.S. film critic Roger Ebert expressed uncertainty about whether films could really be anti-war or pro-war:2
“Patton” was a triumph of acting. Nobody could decide if it were pro-war or anti-war, and nobody seemed much to care. Nobody cared because George C. Scott made it irrelevant. I wonder whether there’s such a thing as an anti-war film, anyway; maybe there are only films that cater to the prejudices of hawks, and films that makes doves happy, but you get to be a hawk or a dove in places other than the movies.
In 1973 François Truffaut questioned the existence of antiwar films as mentioned previously in this article:
. . . I don’t think I’ve really seen an antiwar film. Every film about war ends up being pro-war.
In 1985 Roger Ebert attributed to Truffaut a different phrasing of the saying:3
Francois Truffaut, the late French director, once said there was no such thing as an anti-war film, because all war films looked exciting.
In 1987 Ebert credited Truffaut with another version of the saying:4
The late Francis Truffaut once said it’s not possible to make an anti-war movie, because all war movies, with their energy and sense of adventure, end up making combat look like fun. If he had lived to see “Platoon,” he might have wanted to modify his opinion.
In 1988 Ebert credited Truffaut with still another version of the saying:5
Francois Truffaut once wrote that it was impossible to make an “anti-war film,” because any war film, no matter what its message, was sure to be exhilarating.
In 1998 U.S. director Steven Spielberg released the movie “Saving Private Ryan”. Spielberg published a piece in Newsweek magazine about the depiction of war in movies. Spielberg made a claim that was the opposite of Truffaut’s claim:6
Of course every war movie, good or bad, is an antiwar movie. “Saving Private Ryan” will always be that, but I took a very personal approach in telling this particular war story.
Also, in 1998 Ebert published yet another version of the saying:7
Truffaut once wondered if it was really possible to make an anti-war movie, since war films were inherently exciting and we tend to identify with one side or the other.
In 2005 director Sam Mendes released the movie “Jarhead”, and he was asked whether the movie was antiwar:8
Yes, it may also be seen as an anti-war statement, particularly by those elements who oppose any U.S. involvement in Middle East politics. But, warns Mendes, those would be simplistic responses.
“I think that’s the irony of these things. There’s no such thing as a perfect anti-war movie, because the very things that bleeding liberals or you or I might take to be anti-war, someone else will take to be pro-war or the glorification of war.”
In 2023 “Portland Press Herald” of Portland, Maine printed the following passage from Indie film critic Dennis Perkins:9
The great director Francois Truffaut famously said, “There’s no such thing as an anti-war film.” Truffaut was talking about the inevitably entertaining spectacle of the big-screen undertaking undermining any message suggesting that war isn’t an exciting spectator sport.
In conclusion, François Truffaut deserves credit for the remarks he made to Gene Siskel in 1973 about the depiction of war in films. During subsequent years Roger Ebert and others have credited Truffaut with making thematically similar comments.
Image Notes: Painting of “The Phantom Horseman” by Sir John Gilbert from Birmingham Museums Trust at Unsplash. The image has been cropped and resized.
Acknowledgement: Great thanks to James Callan, Robin Hitchcock, and Moss Elixir whose discussion thread and inquiry led QI to formulate this question and perform this exploration.
- 1973 November 11, Chicago Tribune, The touch that transcends violence and death by Gene Siskel, Quote Page E3, Column 3, Chicago, Illinois. (ProQuest) ↩︎
- 1971 January 5, San Antonio Express, Not Much to Choose From in 1970’s Movie Crop by Roger Ebert (Chicago Sun-Times News Service), Quote Page 8A, Column 3, San Antonio, Texas. (Newspapers_com) ↩︎
- 1985 December 1, Sunday Sun-Journal, Good intentions fall flat in ‘Fever Pitch’ by Roger Ebert, Quote Page 7F, Column 6, Lewiston, Maine. (Newspapers_com) ↩︎
- 1987 January 23, The Sentinel, ‘Platoon’ riveting not exhilarating by Roger Ebert (Film Critic), Section: Alive, Quote Page C5, Column 1, Carlisle, Pennsylvania. (Newspapers_com) ↩︎
- 1988 September 21, The Miami Herald, Letters from Vietnam: Can’t put them down by Roger Ebert, Section: Tempo, Quote Page 2, Column 3, Miami, Florida. (Newspapers_com) ↩︎
- 1998 Summer, Newsweek, Supplement: NewsweekExtra: The 100 Best Movies – A Century On Screen, Volume 131, Issue 25A, Of Guts and Glory by Steven Spielberg, Start Page 66, Quote Page 68, Column 2, Newsweek, New York. (Verified with scans) ↩︎
- 1998 December 4, The Signal, ‘Savior’ leaves you thinking about life by Roger Ebert (Universal Press Syndicate), Section: Escape, Quote Page E8, Column 2, Santa Clarita, California. (Newspapers_com) ↩︎
- 2005 November 4, The Vancouver Sun, Wages of War by Jamie Portman, Section: Arts & Life, Quote Page D1, Column 4, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. (Newspapers_com) ↩︎
- 2023 March 16, Portland Press Herald, Section: Maine Today Magazine, Can cuddly-looking soldiers make war seem more horrific? by Dennis Perkins (Indie Film), Quote Page M18, Column 1, Portland, Maine. (Newspapers_com) ↩︎