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On a dusty landscape, camouflaged soldiers run in formation, then abruptly flatten themselves down on the ground to take cover and pop off shots from their rifles. A heavily armed chopper swoops overhead, and a man with a shoulder-mounted rocket launcher fires off a round into the air. In a flurry of speedy, MTV-style cuts, more tanks and soldiers whiz by, all set to the sounds of mid-‘90s heavy-metal acts Filter and Disturbed. No, it’s not a recruiting commercial, and it’s not a Hollywood production about Iraq (if only!).
It’s a homemade combat video called “Stryker Combat Rotation” made by Army Sgt. Kyle Hausmann-Stokes, a young man who, at 24, has managed to be both a soldier and a filmmaker, and has made it his mission to tell troop stories on the big screen. And with a showing of one of his films at the recent G.I. Film Festival in Washington, D.C., and a coveted spot in the film-production program at University of Southern California (USC), he’s got a real shot. But first, he’s heading to the front.
Hausmann-Stokes looks like a lot of other young men his age: clean cut, spiked hair, khaki pants, a white button-up. But he speaks with a confident-but-understated voice beyond his years; undoubtedly, it’s the almost three years of military service in him talking.
Hausmann-Stokes went into active duty shortly after graduating from high school. From late 2001 through the summer of 2004, he served in Op-For (Opposing Force), training with Iraqis and Afghanis to learn firsthand about terrorist and insurgent techniques. He used this training to teach troops headed to Iraq What to expect from the enemy, calling upon his knowledge of opposition tactics to play the “bad guy” in war games against American soldiers. Hausmann-Stokes writes on his website that learning from and working with the Iraqi and Afghani fighters gave him a “profound understanding, empathy, and respect for middle-eastern cultures.”
While serving with Op-For, he started filming the troops’ combat training and editing the footage into short combat videos (most are available for download). His work gained notice amongst his fellow soldiers, and he began putting together and distributing videos for each of the different groups he trained, earning him a nickname as “the battle-film guy.” Eventually, word of his films made its way to the higher-ups, and just before his unit was scheduled to go to Iraq, he was called into his colonel’s office and told that he was being given a once in a lifetime opportunity: He could stay home from Iraq, provided he went to film school. His mission, he decided, would be to “tell the story of the soldier” from the perspective of someone who’d actually been one.
He’s grateful for the support the armed forces have given him, and appreciates that they appreciate him. “After you make one thing and the brass sees that and thinks, ‘Oh, that’s really cool,’ they give you a lot of opportunity. They’re very accommodating.”
Hausmann-Stokes did a year at Arizona State and another year at USC, where he managed to score a rare slot in the school’s production program, beating out 1,500 applicants for a total of 13 positions. Still, despite being accepted into a premiere film school, he says, “I don’t really want to make big Hollywood blockbusters — I’m more about the in-your-face soldier’s perspective.” And in his music-only short, “Unwelcome Home,” which earned a spot on the big screen at the G.I. Film Festival, that’s just what he does.
But he’ll have to wait a while before he does more Of that. Heading into his junior year, he’s got other plans. The military has him scheduled to go to Iraq.
With a nod toward his contributions off the battlefield, the sergeant was given a deferment option, but he chose deployment. When he heads over, he’ll be working convoy security, making sure supplies make it safely from one point to another. But even this he thinks of as training. “Being a movie director is like being a sergeant. You have your men and you’re responsible for them. There’s a lot of barking commands.” And when he comes back, he’ll get his chance to put his battlefield experience to the test on the set: USC will be holding his place in the production program for him.
Hausmann-Stokes may speak in the reserved voice of a military man, but his enthusiasm is for both filmmaking and the military is tough to miss. One of his combat videos, “Fun With Tanks” is scored to Andrew W.K.’s song “Party Hard,” which features as Its chorus the line, “We do what we like and we like What we do.” For this soldier filmmaker, that’s clearly true.
—Peter Suderman is managing editor of National
Review Online.
Article taken from www.nationalreview.com
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