Proof that I am still thinking about this series everyday, here is a scene analysis I wrote for my FTS 143: Film Theory and Practice class: The first scene I chose is actually from the HBO miniseries, The Pacific (2010), mainly because I thought about this series a lot while reading the second Lacan reading, especially this scene. In this scene Sledge (Joe Mazzello) is encountering the real. He has been hardened by the war (WWII in this series). He is long past the point of losing his young childhood optimism, compassion, and idealism. He now sees himself as a “Jap Killing Machine,” so in this scene he is confronted by a dying Japanese woman. If you go to Amazon Prime and watch the entirety of this scene starting at 43.09 of Episode 9, you will see that the marines also find a baby crying next to its dead family in this hut. This part of the scene is also worth examining, if you have the time and access to the scene. However, when Sledge sees the woman dying on the ground of the hut, the shot-reverse-shot shows the Sledge is not only seeing her, but she is seeing him. Lacan says, “There is the gaze, that is to say, things look at me, and yet I see them. This is how one should understand those words, so strongly stressed, in the Gospel, They have eyes that they might not see. That they might not see what? Precisely, that things are looking at them” (109). Therefore, the use of shot-reverse-shot and a point of view shot from Sledge and from the dying woman, the audience can clearly see the presence of the gaze being articulated. She lifts up her shirt to show her wounds. Sledge then lowers his gun. This might be a stretch, but the lowering of his weapon reminded me of the section in Lacan’s lecture discussing how painters give people a place to lay down their gaze, similar to the way one lays down their weapons (101). I believe an argument can be made that the wound gives Sledge an excuse to lay down his weapon in a similar way. The woman then takes the barrel of the gun and puts it to her head, wanting to be put out of her misery. Extreme closeups are used to show the emotional impact this moment will have on Sledge, closeups are used in this way throughout the series. Then he literally puts down his gun, a close up of it being put on the ground once again draws attention to Lacan’s point of laying down the gaze. Sledge holds her in his arms as she dies. There is a closeup of her hand opening up and a toy rolling out of her hand. This closeup of the hand and the toy on the ground reiterates the real to the audience, that war results in innocent deaths and that despite culture and ethnicity, we are all human. When he exits the hut, Snafu (Rami Malek) asks if he found anything inside. Sledge does not make eye contact with Snafu. He does not share the details of what he had just encountered. This is because the real is traumatic and hard to articulate. Same review on my letterboxd: https://letterboxd.com/teamboby/film/the-pacific/1/