REVIEW 1:
The Peaceful Critic
War. What Is It Really Good Far Anyway?

REVIEW 2:
Atkinson on Film

review 3:
Documentary recounts walk, struggles of activist

War. What is it really good for, anyway?

From August 2005 through August 2006, Sgt. Marshall Thompson wasn't much different from any other American soldier serving in Iraq. By the time Thompson returned home, however, Thompson had become a changed man. What Thompson saw during his year in Iraq as a military journalist changed him forever. By the time Thompson returned home from his tour of duty, Thompson had interviewed thousands of fellow soldiers ranging from privates to generals and he returned home with a startling realization...the war in Iraq was and is an unjust war.

It was a simple realization and yet one that caused Thompson to take an abrupt detour from the military life he'd been living...a life that had included stints in Kosovo, Macedonia and Korea.

Before you start thinking that "A Soldier's Peace," the documentary based upon his life once he returned home from Iraq, is just another story about some commie pinko peacenick I urge you to think again.

Marshall Thompson isn't from a military family, but he had no hesitation about joining the military. He contemplated the Marines and the Army Infantry, before finding out that the Army would offer him the chance to practice his love of journalism. Like many other Americans who were enraged after 9/11, Thompson joined the military with the desire to serve his country and right the wrongs that had been committed that day. Thompson doesn't really qualify as a pacifist, though he can't deny that his experiences in Iraq have given him considerable doubts about the usefulness of war.

Thompson, like many Americans, has simply come to realize that American actions in Iraq began without just cause and continue without just cause and, even worse, to the detriment of the nation we are supposedly helping and to the families of thousands of soldiers killed or permanently disabled by U.S. military actions.

Before his tour of duty in Iraq was finished, Thompson had realized the truth. While it certainly presented him with a moral and ethical dilemma, Thompson still cherished the opportunity to tell the stories of the military's men and women. What he couldn't do any longer, however, was fulfill his responsibilities in creating public relations materials designed to put a positive spin on military actions.

Thompson spoke to his wife Kristen, at home with his two-year-old daughter Eliza, and shared his revelations. Kristen, a lifelong democrat long opposed to the Iraqi war listened and supported her husband as he processed through what would have to happen next.

His tour of duty over, Thompson returned home to a hero's welcome and, much to the dismay of many in his conservative Utah community, immediately began speaking out about this unjust war.

"A Soldier's Peace" is a documentary created by Thompson and his wife, with support from other family members, about what Thompson did upon his return home.

What did Thompson do? He decided to tackle the subject on his homefront, Utah, a notoriously conservative state that until recently polled 20% higher than most other parts of the country in their support of President Bush and U.S. military actions in Iraq. Thompson decided that the best way to get his message out would be to, quite literally, walk 500 miles across Utah with a message of peace, love and understanding.

Sgt. Marshall Thompson became a peace activist.

"A Soldier's Peace" follows Thompson's 28-day journey, one day for each 100 American soldiers killed in Iraq at the point of Thompson's walk, and the people who joined him, opposed him, supported him, guided him and challenged him along the way.

A simple film, shot on a remarkably low budget of $10,000, "A Soldier's Peace" accomplishes much of what Michael Moore attempted to accomplish in "Fahrenheit 9/11." "A Soldier's Peace," however, avoids tricks, gimmicks, confrontations or trickery. Instead, "A Soldier's Peace" simply follows one man who shares his story with crowds, small and large, as he walks across Utah with a simple mesage of peace while simultaneously treating everyone he encounters with the same respect and dignity whether they support his mission or not.

Along the way, Thompson encounters numerous other peace activists including such predictable personalities as Cindy Sheehan, Martin Sheen, one of his own role models in Ron Kovic and, perhaps most unlikely of all, rapper M.C. Hammer. He garners support from a host of peace organizations including Code Pink, Veterans for Peace and several others.

As simple and straightforward as "A Soldier's Peace" is, Thompson keeps the film balanced with equal time and voice given to those who oppose his message. Thompson, who chuckled embarrassingly when a comment was made during the film's Lake County Film Festival screening about his making a film about himself, paints himself positively but with moments of great humanity as he struggles to adjust to the demands of daily walking and, most movingly, when he receives news from his wife about a serious health issue facing his young daughter and, as any parent would do, immediately decides to end the walk.

As could be expected from a $10,000 film, production values for "A Soldier's Peace" are quite modest. They do, however, benefit tremendously from Utah's natural beauty and the intimate nature of the material itself.

"A Soldier's Peace" deservedly captured the Audience Award for Best Documentary Feature during its recent run in the Chicago area's Lake County Film Festival. Only officially discharged from the military in the past couple weeks, Thompson is now working as a reporter for the Standard-Examiner in Ogden, Utah while the film begins its run on the film festival circuit.

One of the greatest parts about being a film critic is that, ever so often, I get to see a film that seemingly comes out of nowhere and just blows me away with its simplicity, beauty, honesty and spirit. "A Soldier's Peace" is such a film.

"A Soldier's Peace," with its subtle blend of humility, humor, dedication and compassion, is an inspiring and thought-provoking look at one man's grassroots effort to create a peaceful world.

© Written by Richard Propes
The Peaceful Critic

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Atkinson on Film
http://www.atkinsononfilm.com/

SOLDIER’S PEACE (Kristen & Marshall Thompson, US, 2007, 82 min.). Sergeant Marshall Thompson, an Army journalist (since 1999), family man, and devout Mormon from Logan, Utah, where his father had been the mayor, came home in 2006 from a year spent in Iraq, a year in which his work led to him interviewing literally thousands of soldiers about their experiences and perceptions while serving in Iraq. He found that the majority eventually arrived at the same conclusion he had drawn: the war was not only unnecessary but unrelentingly harmful to the Iraqi people as well as our own military personnel.
Over his first few months back home, Thompson found his anti-war sentiments deepening, and at some point he began to view himself as a peace activist. He pondered about how to call attention to his point of view, in a state (Utah) well known for its conservative, right wing Republican politics and overwhelming support for George Bush and his Iraq war policy. Thompson decided to go on a personal peace walk, from the northern end of the state to the southern end, from near his hometown of Logan to the Arizona border south of St. George, roughly 500 miles. The walk was calculated to take 27 days (Sundays off for religious observance and a rest), a number chosen to reflect the number of U.S. forces killed in Iraq – at the time around 2,700 – so that each day of the walk represented 100 dead soldiers. Upon learning of Thompson’s plan, state officials initially insisted that he must obtain a permit for his walk, then not only did these same officials deny his application, but also told him that if he started on his roadside walk, he would be arrested “because his walk would have no purpose” (i.e., akin to a vagrancy charge). His attorney father-in-law, collaborating with ACLU lawyers, persuaded the Utah Attorney General to permit Thompson’s peace walk rather than face litigation on violation of his First Amendment rights. The AG capitulated, and Thompson set out, with one friend, early on a rainy morning, October 2, 2006, with his backpack and rain slicker.
This film, co-written and directed by Thompson and his wife, Kristen, first presents the backstory summarized above, then focuses on the walk itself and a number of people who turned out to walk at least part of the way alongside Thompson. The longest walking companion was Doug Firstbrook, an Air Force veteran from the north Oregon Coast who had been a radio broadcast journalist based in Thailand during the Vietnam War. Firstbrook walked with Thompson for 25 of the 27 days. Other walkers came and went as time permitted. Walking through Provo, Thompson was joined by only one Brigham Young University faculty member (and zero students). For a spell Thompson walked shoulder to shoulder with a former Army Ranger who strongly supports the war. By the time he left the walk, this man said that although he disagreed with Thompson, he found him to be a likeable, reasonable, patriotic, solid citizen.
On the 16th day, Thompson received word from his wife that their one year old daughter Elisa had been found to have a tumor on her neck, and doctors feared it could be cancerous. Torn by the pull of his family’s need for his presence and his ambition to complete the walk, Thompson was urged by his wife to continue on, while she sought more definitive diagnosis of Elisa’s condition. Well over 100 people turned out near the end to witness and celebrate the completion of Marshall’s trip. People turned out with peace placards and hundreds of white balloons, one for each person who had communicated their desire to join the walk but who could not break away from commitments at home. One fellow wore a costume in the form of a tall black bomb, and lettered across the front were the words “Drop Bush, Not Bombs.” Marshall’s parents were there. Kristen and Elisa were there (her tumor turned out to be benign). One of Thompson’s heroes was there: Ron Kovic, the paraplegic Vietnam combat veteran and peace activist who was the subject of the docudrama Born on the Fourth of July.
Interspersed with footage of the walk are scenes of Army personnel in Iraq and archival film of Vietnam era protests, focusing in particular on the Kent State incident where National Guard troops killed four students and wounded nine more, a watershed event in turning American public opinion against that war. Also intercut with this material are brief but pithy segments of interviews with Kovic; Cindy Sheehan, whose son was killed in Iraq; Rocky Anderson, the mayor of Salt Lake City and a peace activist himself; Daniel Ellsberg; and representatives of various protest groups, including Iraq Veterans Against the War, Veterans for Peace, Military Families Speak Out, Gold Star Mothers, and Code Pink, a women’s peace organization. Pro-war “counter-protesters” are given their chances to speak as well. Thompson himself is intermittently on camera. He is a calm, well dressed, obviously sincere, unpretentious, patriotic, dedicated peace activist who says at one point, “We can honor those who died without honoring the war.”
If the film’s climax is the celebration at the completion of the walk, its denouement begins with Thompson, walking alone for a 28th day, this time in Washington, DC. The extra day was added to reflect an additional 100 soldiers killed in Iraq during the month in which the walk took place. While there he met with several Congresspersons, including a 45 minute conference with Utah Senator Robert Bennett. Later Thompson applied for a job with a Utah newspaper but was turned down because of his peace walk.
This documentary is expertly photographed and well edited. The narrative arc is excellent. The film is all the more powerful because its tone, and Thompson’s style in particular, are so resolute while at the same time understated, free of anger and histrionics. The music is outstanding and well suited to the visual material, especially the songs “Where is the Rage” (by Pat Scanlan) and “A Soldier’s Peace” (by Hareword Wake). One small fault is that some important still-text shots at the end pass by too quickly to be fully read. At this point the film has been submitted for possible screening at the Sundance Festival next January. No theatrical distribution has yet been arranged, and DVDs are not available to the general public. This fine film deserves wide distribution. Until such access occurs, I can only direct you to Marshall Thompson’s website to keep abreast of developments: www.soldier’speace.com. Grade: B+ (01/14/08).
Salt Lake Tribune, The (UT)

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Documentary recounts walk, struggles of activist
Author: Matthew D. LaPlante The Salt Lake Tribune // March 10, 2008

OGDEN - The opening footage is shaky and washed out - the unmistakable product of a home video camera. But the expression on Marshall Thompson's face could not be more clear.
It said, simply, "I'm home."

But Thompson wasn't home. Not completely. Stricken by guilt and dispirited by public apathy about Iraq after his return home from the war, he resolved to do something.

The Logan-born soldier's resulting journey is recounted in "A Soldier's Peace," which follows Thompson's 500-mile north-to-south trek across Utah in the fall of 2006. The 90-minute documentary made its Utah debut at Ogden's Foursite Film Festival on Saturday.
Much as the one-time Army journalist's reasons for his trek across Utah shifted - at the Idaho border, Thompson called his trek a "stunt" and as he approached Arizona he was more apt to call it "penance" - it is clear that the film, which he co-directed with his wife, Kristen, shifted in theme and purpose as it was shot and edited. What began as an attempt to chronicle Thompson's "Peace Walk" across the "reddest state in the union" became an exploration of the foundations and repercussions of anti-war activism, with peace workers including Martin Sheen, Cindy
Sheehan, Daniel Ellsberg and Ron Kovic helping guide the way.

Their collective message: Peace work is not as trivial as it sometimes is made out to be by conservative America - nor can it be affected without sacrifice.

The blisters that appeared on Thompson's feet on the first day of his walk were only the beginning of the consequences he faced. Officials from the Utah Department of Transportation threatened to arrest him if he was found walking on the side of the highway. (The threat was rescinded after the American Civil Liberties Union got involved.) Along the way, he was chided, screamed at and received a number of spiteful e-mails - including one that suggested he would have been better off if he had been killed in Iraq. And Thompson nearly ended his walk when, halfway through, he learned that his infant daughter had developed a lump on the back of her neck that her doctor feared was cancerous.

"The cost was too great," Thompson said. "What was I doing? Walking through the middle of nowhere when my family needed me?"

Kristen Thompson persuaded her husband to continue his walk while they awaited a second opinion. The lump was later determined to be benign.

Although Thompson had spent a year reporting for the Army in Iraq and was the recipient of a prestigious internship with The Associated Press in Israel, he said he was turned down for a job at his hometown newspaper in Logan by editors who feared his activism was incongruent with the practice of journalism. He is now working as a reporter at the Standard-Examiner in Ogden.
In walking alongside and meeting with activists several times his own age, Thompson also had to come to grips with the idea that anti-war activism is not only a thankless endeavor, but an endless one as well.

Reaching the Arizona border on Nov. 1, 2006, he told a crowd that the end of the journey "feels like a wonderful victory."

"But," he later lamented, "it was very much tempered by the sobering thought that the war was still going on."

More than a year later, with his antiwar story making the film festival circuit, that remains the case.

mlaplante@sltrib.com

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