Eastwood liked it so much he tried to buy it, but was too late. DreamWorks, the Steven Spielberg-David Geffen-Jeffrey Katzenberg company, had already obtained the rights. 友人から薦められて、この映画の元となる著書を読んだイーストウッド。とても気に入り、映画化の権利を買おうとします。しかし・・・スピルバーグ率いるDreamWorksが既に取得済みでした。
"But the years passed and I didn't hear about it. You know, you hear when they're making a movie. But then I ran into Steven Spielberg backstage at the [2003] Academy Awards and the conversation came up. He said, 'Why don't you come on over and direct it?' "
"I didn't want it to be just an action picture. It's about people trying to get away from celebrity and it has lots of overtones for today and maybe for me. I was never comfortable as a celebrity; I was always one for turning away. I loved the acting but not the other stuff. イーストウッドは、この映画を単なるアクション物にしたくなかったそう。有名人扱いから遠ざかろうとした人々について描きたかったと。それは今日の人々や自身の姿に重なるるものがあるから。彼は有名人であることを心地よく思ったことがなく、そこから常に顔を背けようとしていました。演技は好きだけれど、その他のことはそうではなかったと。
Eastwood, in reading "Flags of Our Fathers," found the American-Japanese conflict so fascinating he decided to make a companion film, this time from the Japanese point of view. イーストウッドはFlags of Our Fathersを読んだとき、日米間の対立を見出し、日本側の視点からの姉妹編映画を作ることを決めました。
He seems taken with Tadamichi Kuribayashi, the Japanese commanding officer on Iwo Jima, who, almost like a B-movie stereotype from the '40s, had studied at Harvard, spoke English and had traveled in America, which he enjoyed very much and which he did not want to fight. Still, it was Kuribayashi who designed the brilliant interlocking defensive measures that turned the battle into such a bloodbath, and it is also he who is considered by most historians the author of the best defense of an island against invasion during the war. イーストウッドは栗林忠道に心惹かれたようです。彼は硫黄島での司令官でしたが、ハーバードに学び、英語を話しました。アメリカを旅行したこともあります。そんなことから、彼は戦いたくはありませんでした。それでもなお、すばらしい防衛戦略を考え出したのは彼であり、それが戦いを血みどろの大殺戮へと変えていきました。しかも彼はほとんどの歴史家から、戦時中に侵略から島を守る最高の防衛策の考案者として考えられています。
"Kuribayashi was amazing; in his letters home, he tells his family he's probably not coming back, but at the same time he's completely involved with his family, and is telling his kids to study hard and his wife to get the roof fixed." 「栗林は驚くべき男だ。家族宛の手紙で、たぶん生きて帰れないだろうと告げながらも、同時に家族と全面的にかかわっており、子ども達にしっかり勉強すること、妻に屋根を直すことを書いていた。」とイーストウッド。