‘The Six Triple Eight’ Review: Tyler Perry’s Inspiring World War II Postal Drama (Mostly) Delivers
Movies have been telling stories about World War II since before some history books say World War II even started. What’s more, we’ve never stopped, not for one solitary second. That’s partly because it was arguably the most important historical event in the last 100 years. It’s also because we really, really need to explain to new generations why we should never, ever let fascists rule a country ever again.
But it’s also because there are still, to this day, real stories from WWII that have not been properly told. In some cases, like this year’s “The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare,” it’s because the information was only recently declassified. In others, like Tyler Perry’s “The Six Triple Eight,” it’s because heroic tales of Black soldiers were swept under the rug by racist a-holes who either minimized or completely ignored their rightful place in history.
“The Six Triple Eight” is based on the inspiring story of the 688th Postal Directory Battalion, the only Black U.S. Women’s Army Corps. that was actually sent to Europe during World War II (if you have any trouble memorizing this historical fact, don’t worry, the movie will repeat it many times, including thrice in rapid succession right before the closing credits). Their mission was to fix the broken postal service, which was preventing correspondence from reaching the soldiers’ families and from reaching the soldiers themselves, which had a catastrophic impact on their morale.
Perry’s film stars Ebony Obsidian (“Sistas”) as Lena Derriecott, a young Black woman whose relationship with a Jewish man infuriates the local racists and her own disapproving mother. He’s shipped out to the front and dies extremely quickly, motivating Lena to join the Army and personally give Hitler hell. The Women’s Army Corps. (WAC) doesn’t go into battle, and it seems unlikely that she’ll be shipped anywhere near the front, but her commanding officer Major Charity Adams (Kerry Washington) is determined to show the U.S. military that Black women have what it takes, despite the systemic and virulent racism getting in their way.
Lena makes a lot of friends in the WAC but they’re mostly thinly drawn archetypes: the rebellious one, the prudish one, and a few others who don’t even make that much of an impression. To be frank, Perry’s screenplay is exceptionally clunky in the film’s first act, delivering exposition in awkward chunks and introducing many characters with drab contrivance. The groundwork is awkwardly laid but once it’s finally in place, the cast is free to build a satisfying, inspirational monument to the heroes this movie celebrates.
The plot kicks in when Eleanor Roosevelt, Franklin Delano Roosevelt and trailblazing civil rights activist Mary McLeod Bethune decide to push a crappy and seemingly incompetent racist named General Halt (Dean Norris) to give the Six Triple Eight the task of fixing the military’s mail program. The Roosevelts and Bethune are played by Susan Sarandon, Sam Waterston and Oprah Winfrey, only of whom Sarandon has more than a couple lines or, indeed, appears in more than a few shots. We can’t stop here — this is cameo country.
The second half of “The Six Triple Eight” is dedicated to the women solving the military’s problems and getting no respect whatsoever for their troubles. Major Adams is disrespected in public by a lower-ranking officer, and although she insists that he’ll be court-martialed, he never sees any consequences. The soldiers are stationed in a dilapidated building with no heat, no resources, and are also expected to “entertain” the other Black soldiers on the weekends. And when the brass finally gets around to sending them a chaplain, let’s just say you’ll soon want to spit on him.
Perry isn’t exactly known for directing epic productions, and “The Six Triple Eight” sometimes looks a little on the cheap side. The film’s one big battle scene, right at the beginning, is a bit anemic, and every soldier hit by enemy fire has a tendency to float into the air in an unconvincing fashion. But most of the time, the movie looks solid, and kudos to Perry and his cinematographer Michael Watson (“Echoes”) for a novel and exhilarating dance sequence at one of the soldiers’ soirees. It’s a lively and welcome addition to an otherwise effective but conventional production.
Still, the cast often struggles with Perry’s heavy-handed dialogue. Washington spends a lot of the film yelling, because she’s a commanding officer and in movies that’s mostly what they do. Yet she’s convincing as a leader and when the film finally opens up and shows her at ease, she brings complexity to Major Adams that isn’t always obvious in the text.
The rest of the cast does their job, but with limited material, so there isn’t much room for most of them to really shine. Obsidian is given heavy-handed emotional cues in almost every scene, which looks and feels exhausting. Shanice Shantay (“Perfect Harmony”) gets most of the funniest and frankest dialogue, and she makes the most of it, injecting the film with much-needed energy. Milauna Jackson (“A Jazzman’s Blues”) spins her relatively small role as Major Adams’ second officer and only confidant into actual gold.
It’s absurd and insulting that there hasn’t been a movie about the Six Triple Eight until now. It’s an important story to tell, and Tyler Perry tells it respectfully. It never quite kicks into high gear, and plays a lot more like a TV movie from the 1990s — a very good decade for historical TV movies — than a major feature in the 2020s. But it does what it absolutely must do, illuminate an important and inspirational chapter of American history, while making sure these heroic women are given long-overdue cinematic accolades.
“The Six Triple Eight” is now streaming on Netflix.
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