I don't know how original it was in ol 1971; but I wasn't introduced to a single new idea in this movie.I also don't see how this movie is about the war... other than the fact that we know it suppose to be an anti war movie. And that we know that he was "injured" in the war. There is probably only a one scene that happens in a war. What you see in the trailer, are the heights of the scenes (probably all of them). But the scenes ware starched to an hour and 40 minutes. Maybe if it was 30 minutes; it would be, eeh... decent. But the way it is now, is way too long for that idea.I never wrote a review, till now. Just wanted to give a friendly warning, from someone how can watch a heavy movie; otherwise I wouldn't even try it. Thought this movie had something to say... it didn't. Not to someone who watched some good motion pictures in this day and age.

In 1972 I was 16 and living on my own in NYC. The era was tumultuous and I was naive enough to believe that tumult was the norm. That time was tailor made for the vision of Trumbo. In a different but appropriate way, today is too. I had read JGHG in my HS freshman year and seeing the title on a marquee in Soho I bought a ticket.I won't remark on storyline or the skills brought to bear by the principals or dwell on how the ethos, pathos and logos of Trumbo's piece are resonant now as then.I will relay this information. I left that theater shattered. I knew the story, the book was faithfully translated to the screen albeit abbreviated. Nonetheless the delivery of JGHG on screen affected me to a degree that no other single piece did before or has since. I am a middle aged man now with grandchildren, and the uncle of young men who served in foreign wars. I have yet to reconcile my disdain for people who take advantage of their positions to send our children to their deaths with my understanding that some things are worth our blood and treasure. We each carry our own unique moral baggage to our concepts of war. My baggage was made manifest at an afternoon matinée one rainy day in 1972, almost 40 years ago but cemented in my psyche. This is my testimony to the power of Dalton Trumbo's work.In case the magnitude of its impact has not been strongly enough emphasized here, I should note that I have had a copy of JGHG in my film library for some time but have not watched it. I just can't bring myself to go through that again as there is no cathartic effect or anything approaching relief to be had.

There is absolutely nothing flashy about this movie.It stands unpretentiously as a disturbingly simple film depicting the horrors of war to a generation fed up with Vietnam (much in the same way MASH did, except that MASH used the Korean War to stand in for Vietnam, while this uses World War I.) "Johnny Got His Gun" tells us the story of Joe Bonham, a young American soldier horribly wounded, so that he has no arms, no leg, and no face. He is a head and a torso. The doctors assume that because of his injuries he has no consciousness, no sense of feeling, and so they set out to keep him alive as long as possible - basically to see how long they can do it. Joe, though, is frighteningly conscious, aware of everything happening to him and around him. The military comes across as heartless and uncaring. The nursing staff comes off as slightly more compassionate toward this poor unfortunate. The scenes in the hospital are narrated by Timothy Bottoms (who plays Joe) as he relates all that he's experiencing. A significant part of the movie is also told by way of flashback, as we explore where Joe came from and what his life had been like and what his dreams are. Donald Sutherland appears in these "dream" sequences as Christ in a series of conversations Joe has about he nature of reality.This isn't a squeamish film. We hear about Joe's injuries but we don't see them. There are a lot of the familiar points made about war - I certainly recognized a point made most recently by Michael Moore in Fahrenheit 911 about the old men who won't be asked to fight sending off the young men to fight and die. Joe himself is clearly representative (in an admittedly extreme way) of the millions of young men whose lives are devastated by war and who will never be the same again, even if they survive. The story doesn't tell us Joe's ultimate fate. He figures out a way to communicate by morse code by shaking his head, but what becomes of him is left as an open question.This is apparently a low budget film, and it's in no way fancy. That's appropriate, because the subject matter doesn't need any glorification. Its power may actually be in its very simplicity.

On the last day of Word War I, a soldier named Joe (Timothy Bottoms) is hit by an artillery shell that doesn't kill him but destroys all of his limbs, face, vision, hearing and ability to speak. He wakes up in a hospital where he can feel people's presence in the room by the vibrations they make on the floor but cannot communicate with them in any way, causing him extreme anxiety. All he has left is his imagination which he uses to revisit his sometimes surreal memories of his childhood and youth, remembering especially his father (Jason Robards), girlfriend (Kathy Fields) and deceased army buddies. He also has conversations with Jesus himself (Donald Sutherland), but not even He seems to know how to help.The contrast between reality and Joe's dreams is marked by switches from black & white to colour. In the hospital room we can hear Joe's desperate voice trying to make contact with the doctors and nurses who either don't pay attention or just can't understand him. Only one of the nurses (Diane Varsi) truly wants to see him as a human being anymore. It's very easy to feel his pain and hearing him begging the doctors via Morse code to either make him a public demonstration of the horrors of war or just kill him is one of the most effective anti-war scenes ever. The very last scene should haunt the audience for a long time after the film has ended.Even though a bedridden shadow of a man sounds like an unlikely subject for a film, Johnny Got His Gun succeeds excellently. The anti-war message is heavy, but what other kind of message can you have about a world war? The heart-breaking story, diverse visual style, steady direction and strong performances by Bottoms, Robards and Varsi make the film a powerful work of art. It is one of the best war films I've seen and I'll recommend it to anyone looking for an effective cinematic experience in any genre.