I saw Black Hawk Down last night

[Bruegger]

Excellent flick -- well worth the long wait in line

This is now among my top three war movies of all time.

Remarkably faithful to the book, though some characters are merged (e.g., the Stebbins --> Grimes change), and there's some fanciful dialogue inserted. But well-executed.

The battle scenes are top-notch. The actors do a good job of portraying Rangers and Delta guys. Weaponry and the effects on targets is reasonably well-portrayed, without too much Hollywood-ization.

It does a great job of immersing you in the battle and gives you a good idea of how hairy and chaotic it must have been.

Bruegger gives it -- FOUR STARS.

Semper fi,
Bruegger out.

 

[ATTICUS]

NPR trashed it....so it must be pretty good. I'll definately be at the head of the line when it gets here.

 

[Waterdog]

Don't ruin it for me, PLEASE. I want to enjoy this flick, so keep most of what you saw, quiet.

Thanx

Waterdog

 

[TheBluesMan]

I have seen very few movies that are as good as or better than the book upon which they are based. I hope that Black Hawk Down will join The Shawshank Redemption, Field of Dreams and Stand By Me on that short list.

Unfortunately there are too many movies like Starship Troopers and Dune that don't do justice to the books.

 

[Skorzeny]

Elvis Mitchell on "The New York Times" trashed it as well. Why? Here is an excerpt:

In "Black Hawk Down," the lack of characterization converts the Somalis into a pack of snarling dark-skinned beasts, gleefully pulling the Americans from their downed aircraft and stripping them. Intended or not, it reeks of glumly staged racism. The only African-American with lines, Specialist Kurth (Gabriel Casseus), is one of the American soldiers who want to get into the middle of the action; his lines communicate his simplistic gung-ho spirit. His presence in this military action raises questions of racial imbalance that "Black Hawk Down" couldn't even be bothered to acknowledge, let alone answer.

Ah, excuse me, Mr. Mitchell. These Somali militiamen were on drugs (Khat), hid behind women and children and took pot shots at our soldiers and, yes, they did "gleefully pull the American from their downed aricraft and strip them." That's called being faithful to the actual events. I'm sorry that the reality of what happened doesn't fit your Kumbaya-let's-all-hold-hands vision of the world.

And what "racial imbalance" are you speaking of? This is a movie about a band of Americans (whatever their skin color) who tried their best to save each other in a mission gone bad, surrounded by a bloodthirsty mob with AKMs and RPGs. Not everything in the world is about race and "racial imbalance" for gosh sakes!

Some people are so jaded, cynical or deluded, that everything in life has to been seen through a racial prism. And such people get to write movie reviews for the great "The New York Times."

I'm going to see the film, for sure.

Skorzeny

 

[Deadman]

I wonder what Elvis Mitchell will have to say if the War on terrorism extends to Somalia during the next couple of years?

 

[dinosaur]

Be glad Oliver Stone didn`t direct.

Most of the movie would be devoted to the despair of a hopeless people who revert to drugs for relief. Racial profiling in foreign lands. :barf:

 

[Kharn]

Only the NYT would worry about racial quotas on a movie based on real life. If they directed a movie on the writing of the Consitution, James Madison would be Hispanic, Thomas Jefferson would be black, Ben Franklin would be Chinese and George Washington would be a lesbian. History is written by the winner, and we cant let the liberals rewrite it.

Kharn

 

[Rich Lucibella]

Tech Advisor and (I believe) Co-Producer Credits for BHD go to our very own Harry Humphries, who also gave us such realistic firearms and battle sequences as The Rock, GI Jane, Armageddon, the first season of SOF and others.

Harry is a plank-holder at TFL and a column writer at S.W.A.T. I give Harry much credit....Hollywood is largely responsible for the atrocious gun handling we see in American society. Harry proves that movies don't have to be dull to demonstrate proper gun handling and movement.

(Commercial Plug: Look for a behind the scenes feature Training Hollywood in the May issue of S.W.A.T.)
Rich

 

[Skorzeny]

I should add, BTW, Elvis Mitchell also compared "Blackhawk Down" to "Three Kings," stating how superior the latter was in getting "political contexts" right.

Excuse me again. While I liked "Three Kings," it was a work of F-I-C-T-I-O-N! One can afford to have the "political contexts" right when one can make the story up. With "Blackhawk Down," the filmmaker would have done the author and the ment who fought the battle a great disservice if he had altered the real facts to fit someone else's sense of "political contexts."

For sake of full disclosure, I should add that Mr. Mitchell is an African-American.

Roger Ebert, on the other hand, listed the film as no. 2 among top ten movies of 2001. He got the message of the movie - which was about desperate men fighting courageously to survive in the midst of a military mission gone bad.

Skorzeny

 

[CastleBravo]

Strikes me as odd reading movie reviews that criticize a flick for its portrayal of actual events.

 

[KSFreeman]

Rich, Hollywood is only partly responsible; gun rags are the other part--fingers on triggers, weapons without magazines, pointing at themselves or others and wearing flowered shirts.

 

[Johnny Guest]

Portrayal of Actual Events? Sure, but - - -

- - the fact that something is based upon a true incident is sledom any indicator that the portrayers will GET IT RIGHT, CastleBravo.



I know you know better--I've read a lot of your stuff before.

Best,
Johnny

 

[CastleBravo]

Johnny,

Do I need to explain what I mean by "actual events"? What is this, a Clinton impeachment hearing?

Example: the Rangers in Somalia shot a bunch of dark skinned people in real life. The Rangers in Somalia shot a bunch of dark skinned people in Black Hawk Down. Reviews criticize movie for showing lots of dark skinned people getting shot. Thus, they criticize the movie for portraying actual events.

I say again:

 

[Skorzeny]

Actually, Elvis Mitchell complained of "racism" because the Somali militiamen were portrayed as "snarling dark-skinned beasts." News flash! Many of those militiamen WERE snarling beasts who were drugged up on Khat. It was merely a geographic coincidence that they were dark-skinned.

Also, Mitchell complained because the sole African-American character of Specialist Kurth was "gung-ho" and didn't address racism.

I suppose Mr. Mitchell would've been happier if the snarling Somali militiamen (many of whom had known nothing but savage clan wars since they were children) were portrayed either 1) by white actors or 2) as Geneva-convention-abiding gentlemen soldiers (proud and noble descendants of African princes). And, he would've been happier still if, instead of a gung-ho patriotic Ranger, Specialist Kurth was the type who constantly made speeches about the inequities of racism throughout the movie (while being shot with everything from AKMs, RPKs, RPGs, hand grenades and etc.).

Skorzeny

 

[Bruegger]

Don't miss this movie!

This movie really was done right. It did the book justice, totally unlike "Starship Troopers." Ugh. That one made me want to puke. Actually, if they had just called it something else and not tried to pass it off as the Heinlein story, I would have been OK with it.

As for the NYT trashing it, that's a good enough endorsement to see the movie. "Three Kings" better? NO STINKING WAY! That movie blew chunks compared to Black Hawk Down. The only reason he liked that movie was it was down on the Gulf War.

There's the old joke about the NYT to the effect of: if there was a
Martian invasion of the Earth, the NYT cover story would be "Mars Invades Earth: Women and Minorities Effected."

But back to Black Hawk Down...

Weapons handling was excellent. Weapons-related special effects were excellent. Character development wasn't the greatest, but come on, there were something like forty speaking parts! How could you properly develop that many characters in two and a half hours? Besides, this is a war movie, not a love story.

See it. Best movie I've seen in a long time. Right up there with Band of Brothers and Saving Private Ryan.

Semper fi,
Bruegger out.

 

[stevetuna]

Can't wait to see this movie! Thanks for your review, Bruegger! And if NPR and the NYTimes trash it, I'll see it five times and buy the DVD the day it shows up!

Glad to hear the movie stays true to the book. I hear the screenwriting team of GWB / Rummy are working on the sequel for release in early 2002!!!

 

[Johnny Guest]

Waiting with bated breath - - -

- - Looking forward to this movie as I haven't anticipated another for years!

I'm in the process of reading book right now, and have seen all the teasers on TV, and a full movie-theater preview. My appetite is whetted, nay, HONED.

CastleBravo--
No offense intended. I say again, we've all seen movies PURPORTING to portray real-life where the movie makers got it horribly wrong. I understand from Bruegger's review that they apparently got THIS one right, and I am gratified.

Speaking of reviews, I was warmly surprised to read the Sidney Baldwin review in the 24 DEC issue of Newsweek, and finding that it is a GOOD review- - -Four Stars, in fact. I quote, in part - -

Imagine if the Normandy-Invasion sequence in "Saving Private Ryan went on for a hundred minutes instead of 20, and you'll have some idea of the bloody, harrowing intensity of Ridley Scott's movie. . . . this is a war movie shorn of all its usual accouterments" the battle is the plot.
. . . Scott isn't interested in politics or flag waving: the heroism he depicts has nothing to do with a cause, and everything to do with a soldier's reflexive instinct to protect his brother in arms. . . . You leave this long movie feeling battered, drained -- and thinking about the soldiers in Afghanistan whose lives are on the line right now.

A review nearly as good as Bruegger's, really, but without B's eye for technical detail, perhaps.

Best,
Johnny

 

[tankertom]

I haven't seen the movie yet but the book makes a point that the Rangers were almost all white. They compared it to the 10th Mountain which was more diverse.

TT

 

[Waitone]

I am one-half through the book.

Impression--One-half the book is devoted to the first HOUR of the attack. Intense.

Question--where the hell was air cover?