“The Mosquito Bowl” and the human cost of war

Okinawa turned out to be the last and costliest battle of World War II in the Pacific – and it’s a name director Peter Berg wants us all to remember. His new film, “The Mosquito Bowl,” captures that battle. “It’s a film that I hope asks us all to think about what we ask of our young men and women,” he said.

“The Mosquito Bowl” is based on the book by Buzz Bissinger, who also wrote “Friday Night Lights,” which became Berg’s breakout film. But don’t let the title fool you: this isn’t a movie about a football match. “No, it’s not; it’s a film about the cost of war, the human cost of war,” Berg said.

The human cost of war told through the true story of four American football players who volunteered for the Marines after Pearl Harbor and reported to boot camp at Parris Island, South Carolina, where we interviewed Berg. “They came here and joined the Marine Corps thinking: Hey, we’re going to win this thing. We’re gonna kick butt and win this thing, like we win our football games“, Berg said. “Then they encounter an enemy, the Japanese, to whom their emperor, whom they believe to be a god, asked them not to surrender.”

They first encountered the Japanese on a small piece of coral called Tarawa. When images of the American deaths on Tarawa Beach reached the United States, the public became aware for the first time of the human cost of the war. This is the first battle sequence in the film.

“I wanted it to be as hard and intense as possible,” Berg said. “I wanted it to be terrifying, because that’s what I think it was.”

Berg’s immersive cinematic style uses real flamethrowers and explosions. This is also his research style. For “Friday Night Lights,” he spent a season with a Texas high school football team. For “Lone Survivor,” he spent a month with the Navy SEALs in Iraq.

He wrote most of the screenplay for “The Mosquito Bowl” on Parris Island. “It gets in the blood,” he says. “And then I wear this, I try to do it, on set. And that’s why I don’t worry about brands, I don’t care if your jacket is perfect, I don’t care about the lighting; I want the soul.”

For Berg, these Parris Island recruits represent the human cost of future wars. “It’s a very, very powerful force,” he said. “This is a very dangerous group of human beings. And I feel responsible.”

To understand Berg, you have to understand that his father was a Marine who served in the Korean War. “My father is buried in Arlington,” he said. “And I love my dad a lot. I go to his grave and have conversations with him now. They’re great, because I can talk and he has to listen!”

He said he once told his father about the “Mosquito Bowl.” When asked what he said to her, Berg choked up and apologized. “Very emotional for me,” he later explained. “I told him I was sorry he couldn’t see this movie. He would have loved this movie.”

It owes its name to a football match played on the island of Guadalcanal shortly before the Marines left for Okinawa. “A football game that, to me, is only important as an opportunity for these young men to remember the good in life,” Berg said.

“That football game was a big event. It was a big deal,” Neal McCallum said. Now 99, he wasn’t yet 18, but he was there. He had joined the Marine Corps ten days after his 17th birthday. “I wanted to participate in the war and do my part,” he said.

McCallum’s memory, along with a photo of the opening handshake and a mimeographed program, are all that remains of the game between two Marine regiments, each loaded with college football stars.

“Oh, it was a great game, so it was a draw,” McCallum said. The final score: 0-0. “They wanted to play again, but the colonel of the 4th Marines said he couldn’t take that risk and hurt his Marines, because he knew we were going into combat soon.”

The battle took place on Okinawa, and Berg, who started out as an actor, plays the commanding general, telling his Marines: “There’s nothing I’d love more than to tell you this is going to get easier. It’s not. I’d love to tell you there’s going to be no more casualties, no more deaths. That’s not true.”

Berg recreated the hellish landscape of Okinawa in a quarry in Australia, although nothing can replicate the horrors of that 82-day battle. “The losses on Okinawa were just unbearable, and it was a great sacrifice, a great sacrifice,” McCallum said. “Of course, these young guys lost their lives. They didn’t have opportunities like me. I survived the war.”

More than 12,000 Americans were killed, including 15 of the football stars who played in the Mosquito Bowl. And, as Berg shows, the loss of life among Japanese soldiers and Okinawan civilians was almost unimaginable.

“How can you forget something like that?” asked McCullum. “It was so intense you won’t forget it.”

You may not remember the exact numbers, but Berg worked to ensure that you never forget the human cost of war. “I want you to feel like you’re living this,” he said. “I want people to say, ‘I felt it. I felt it. I didn’t think about it, but I felt it.'”

To watch a trailer for “The Mosquito Bowl,” click on the video player below:

Story produced by David Rothman. Publisher: Georges Pozderec.

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