《榮歸》是一部戰(zhàn)爭(zhēng)題材的電影，講述了戰(zhàn)爭(zhēng)結(jié)束后所帶來(lái)的悲劇。故事發(fā)生在美國(guó)加州的一家傷兵醫(yī)院，主角盧克是一位受傷的士兵，他因戰(zhàn)爭(zhēng)而失去了幸福和自由，成為了一個(gè)半身不遂的人。這使得他每天都生活在抑郁和憤怒之中。莎莉是一位軍官的妻子，她有責(zé)任安撫在戰(zhàn)爭(zhēng)中受傷的軍人。在這個(gè)過(guò)程中，她與盧克相遇，并逐漸愛(ài)上了他。為了給盧克帶來(lái)繼續(xù)生活下去的希望，她不惜用自己的身體去引誘他。這部電影揭示了戰(zhàn)爭(zhēng)對(duì)人們生活所造成的深遠(yuǎn)影響。戰(zhàn)爭(zhēng)不僅奪走了人們的生命，還帶走了他們的幸福和自由。盧克的遭遇讓觀眾深刻感受到戰(zhàn)爭(zhēng)的殘酷和無(wú)情。劇情中的莎莉展現(xiàn)了一個(gè)勇敢而無(wú)私的形象，她愿意為了盧克的幸福犧牲自己。這種無(wú)私的愛(ài)情令人動(dòng)容，同時(shí)也引發(fā)了觀眾對(duì)于道德和倫理的思考。《榮歸》通過(guò)戰(zhàn)爭(zhēng)的背景，以及角色之間的情感糾葛，深入探討了戰(zhàn)爭(zhēng)對(duì)人性的摧殘和考驗(yàn)。這部電影不僅僅是一部戰(zhàn)爭(zhēng)片，更是一部關(guān)于人性和愛(ài)情的感人之作。觀眾在觀影過(guò)程中會(huì)被劇情所觸動(dòng)，思考戰(zhàn)爭(zhēng)對(duì)人們的影響，以及愛(ài)情在困境中的力量。

Hal Ashby’s anti-war manifesto COMING HOME has a killer opening and ending - an improv conversation from real-life paraplegic Vietnam War vets, among whom, Luke Martin (Voight) remains silent, paying due respect to other’s authenticated voice; and for the ending, Ashby goes understatedly poetic, juxtaposing three protagonists’ respective actions and topping the movie off with a radical sucker-punch, sometimes death can be aligned with such beauty, especially against the nature force which hits like a juggernaut -, which leaves everything in between wobbling between a stern censure of war’s atrocity and futility, and a felicitous meet-cute between an able-bodied woman and a disabled man.

Hitting the home run of being nominated for 8 Oscars, including the Big Five and all four acting categories (eventually won 3), COMING HOME is a seminal cinema agitprop that jumps on the bandwagon of Vietnam War’s disillusioned sequela, and rams home its lucid message with poignancy, compassion and persuasion, if less artfully, as the plain truth speaks volumes itself.

Jane Fonda plays an ordinary military wife Sally Hyde, when her Captain husband Bob (Dern) is deployed to Vietnam in 1968, she finds vocation in volunteer work at a nearby veterans hospital, where she meets her former high school classmate Luke, now paraplegic and seething with grievance. The two strikes up a friendship that is profuse of romantic tingles, what will it take for Sally to two-time her husband? A cocktail of her compassion (pity sex is something we can all bank on), Luke’s winning charm, Bob’s prejudice and gung-ho spirit, plus a deep-seated void needs to fulfilled (the earth finally moved thanks to Luke, sans priapic penetration, a revolutionary moment of addressing female orgasm in American cinema), Sally’s transmogrification takes shape both physically (hairdo, an eyesore to today’s aesthetics) and mentally (her view of the war alters organically by the horrific aftermath she experiences firsthand in the hospital), albeit at the cost of her morality, which Ashby deems of much less import than the imperative to “stop war and make love”, in fact, Sally and Luke’s union represents a quintessential American dream which is consummated belatedly, between a school jockey and a cheerleader.

By cramming the movie with a rich soundtrack of iconic hits (The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, Tim Buckley, Bob Dylan, Aretha Franklin, Simon and Garfunkel, you name it!), COMING HOME incubates an unsetting discrepancy with its drab palette and bleak reality (a suicide is witnessed with not enough emergency but apathy), and really has its finger on the pulse of the zeitgeist. Narratively, Ashby doesn’t mince words about his true cause, thus subtlety is wanting in expressing the obvious.

For the two Oscar-winning performances, both Fonda and Voight should owe their victory as much to serendipity as their own aptitude, an Oscar No. 2 is quite a feather in Fonda’s cup, only Sally is entrenched with a rather uninspiring character arc, her ordinariness is too much in the forefront, although Fonda delivers an all-around effort to extricate Sally from her conservative shell, still, her inscape is sadly, without much complexity to be astonished about (Jessica Lang has done a finer job in Tony Richardson’s posthumous BLUE SKY 1994); Voight, apart from his touching peroration near the end, carries off with a hefty tang that we never know where his damage lies, whether he recovers or not, there is a perceivable sadness in his slightly stiff smile, the scar is appalling, keep smiling, man.

The unknown Penelope Milford reaps an Oscar nomination as Sally’s gal pal Vi Munson, which she earns with one scene by unleashing Vi’s bottled-up devastation at her brother’s demise. Last but definitely not the least, a terrific Bruce Dern, though losing out his Oscar to Christopher Walken in THE DEER HUNTER (1978), is actually, mesmerizing in eking out Bob’s pent-up disintegration with superlative assurance and explosiveness, which essentially elevates the coda to the stratosphere of its much-needed impressiveness, for what it is worth, Hal Ashby’s COMING HOME ultimately rises above its own political agenda and finds humanity in its core, for that reason alone, it deserves a place of its own.

referential entries: Ashby’s HAROLD AND MAUDE (1971, 7.4/10), THE LAST DETAIL (1973, 8.1/10), BEING THERE (1979, 8.3/10); Tony Richardson’s BLUE SKY (1994, 6.1/10).