I've been seeing the commercials and teasers for Flags of Our Fathers for a few weeks now.  This is the new Clint Eastwood directed film based around the events that led to the Iwo Jima memorial and the infamous photograph that was turned into the monument and memorial.

Last nite I happened to catch a bit of this week's Ebert and Roeper and they had an early look at the movie.  I was interested in seeing the movie before, but after seeing the first look that Roeper and his guest host had, I'm even more interested.

I would caution movie goers that haven't educated themselves in advance about this film to do some research first.  This is not a prototypical war movie, and the story that is presented is not exactly the one that many people have in their minds about Iwo Jima and the flag raising.  I don't want to spoil the movie, but I would encourage people to do the research and learn what happened at Iwo Jima and the events that followed later with the publishing of the famous picture and even later when the monument was created.

Actually the movie is based on the best selling book by James Bradley and Ron Powers.  Bradley wrote the story based on letters and other items his family found about his father's (John Bradley) involvement in the events at Iwo Jima.  More information on the book can be found at Amazon.com here.  As usual, this is likely a case where the book would be more rewarding than the film, though I think that Clint Eastwood will do a great job with the material and his handling of the story will be incredibly respectful.

I should note that this movie is a Dreamworks Pictures project, produced by both Clint Eastwood and Steven Spielberg.  Another name of note that is attached to the project is writer Paul Haggis.  Viewers of the great HBO series Entourage would be familiar with that name thanks to an appearance in the most recent season of that show.  Haggis is also well known as the writer for the award winning film Crash, as well as many other things seen on the small screen in the past.

Anyway, I am looking forward to this film, and hope to see it during it's initial run.  If not, I will surely see it on DVD and will likely add the DVD to my collection with it gaining a home close to Band of Brothers and Saving Private Ryan (among others).