Clearly, I missed this reference. But there was that one scene where the Captain got the nickname “Yellow Stain”. The Caine was supposed to drop a yellow dye marker under fire and they broke and ran (at least that’s how I remember it - but like you, it has been a number of years since I saw it, and could easily be wrong). But the play, on which the film was based did not use the scene so it was not essential.
It was a critical scene in the film, where Queeg is neglectful of his duty to properly cover troop transports, proving him to be not just a petty dictator and irresponsible, but fundamentally incapable of command of a ship of war. This, along with his (mis)handling of the Caine in a typhoon is what justifies the titular mutiny.
I don’t know that I’d say it’s not a war movie–I haven’t read the Herman Wouk novel, but the film ends on a note of how Queeg was one of the officers in the pre-war peacetime Navy who sacrificed much for his career, et cetera, and the officers were not respectful of either him or the Navy in not either standing by him and buffering him or going to the fleet commander and reporting his errant behavior, instead cowardly standing aside until Queeg made critical errors of judgement owing to his paranoia. The courtroom scenes in the film are all in the last reel.
I think half my posts on this site must be pimping this movie, but I’ll mention it again: Regeneration (aka Behind the Lines in the US). There are a couple very brief battle scenes, but it’s set primarily in a hospital for shell-shocked soldiers during WWI. It’s about psychological trauma and healing, and protest, and poetry. And it’s wonderful.
Grave of the Fireflies depicts some acts from WW2 (firebombing), but by in large is more about the effect that war can have on the children of a country.
What about Saving Private Ryan. Soldiers, on active duty, in the middle of a war, but their primary mission has nothing to do with ensuring that the war is won?
There’s also The Best Years of Our Lives which is about soldiers, but in their undeployed, post-war lives. Doesn’t exactly fit the category, but I wanted to give it a shout-out anyway.
Wouk adapted a stage version of his novel titled The Caine Mutiny Court Martial which focuses solely on the trial and the combat actions are only described. The 1998 TV-movie version matches the OP’s request far better than the 1954 Bogart film.
No, Jarhead, Saving Private Ryan, and Thin Red Line are ALL war movies. They can be nothing but war movies. The entire cast of characters consists of soldiers, on active duty, during war, on the battlefield, in combat. It’s like saying Days of Thunder isn’t about auto racing.
Legends of the Fall, on the other hand is set in the context of a war but is not a war movie. A small part of the movie takes place on the battlefield during WWI. The rest of the movie deals with the relationships of the family after the effects of that war.
