I finished this movie two nights ago, and it's not that I've been putting off posting about it; I just haven't really figured out what to say about it. It's such an earnest war movie that, in the wrong hands, would come across like all kinds of horribly over-the-top jingoism. It's got Mel Gibson, who more or less became a pariah immediately following this 2002 performance when he went off the anti-Semitic deep end. It's about the Vietnam War - probably the least popular war in American History - and yet it isn't an anti-war movie whatsoever. It's got all the elements of a movie it'd be easy to snark about, but somehow, I've got nothing negative to say at all. This was a damn good war movie that felt far more complete than so many others I've seen. The enemy North Vietnamese were depicted as intelligent and hardened war fighters, rather than ruthlessly violent savages. The movie spent just the right amount of time focusing on scenes back at home where the wives of several soldiers received those oh-so-worst-case telegrams. And rather than make it the story about one man's quest for vengeance or redemption, they allowed for a simpler and more vulnerable scope: the courage and commitment these soldiers had, and the extent to which they dedicated and sacrificed themselves to protect each other. I can only speak fondly of this straight-played Mel Gibson Vietnam War movie, and that's quite an accomplishment.
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