On February 9, 1943, the battle of Guadalcanal in the southwest Pacific ended with an American victory over Japanese forces (World War 2). (Click here to read the article in the NY Times.)  One of my favorite movies is a dramatization of this event.  Based on Director Terrence Malick’s adaptation of James Jones’ autobiographical 1962 novel, “The Thin Red Line” focuses not only on the conflict and battle scenes at Guadalcanal during the second World War, but also on the conflict and battle between good and evil in the human heart.   A couple of quotes from the film follow (courtesy of IMDB):

Private Witt: [voice over] This great evil. Where does it come from? How’d it steal into the world? What seed, what root did it grow from? Who’s doin’ this? Who’s killin’ us? Robbing us of life and light. Mockin’ us with the sight of what we might’ve known. Does our ruin benefit the earth? Does it help the grass to grow, the sun to shine? Is this darkness in you, too? Have you passed to this night?

Private Witt: I remember my mother when she was dyin’, looked all shrunk up and gray. I asked her if she was afraid. She just shook her head. I was afraid to touch the death I seen in her. I couldn’t find nothin’ beautiful or uplifting about her goin’ back to God. I heard of people talk about immortality, but I ain’t seen it. I wondered how it’d be like when I died, what it’d be like to know this breath now was the last one you was ever gonna draw. I just hope I can meet it the same way she did, with the same… calm. ‘Cause that’s where it’s hidden – the immortality I hadn’t seen.