From: leeper@cbnewsj.cb.att.com (mark.r.leeper)
Subject: A FEW GOOD MEN
Organization: AT&T
Date: Mon, 14 Dec 1992 18:46:27 GMT

                               A FEW GOOD MEN
                      A film review by Mark R. Leeper

          Capsule review:  A FEW GOOD MEN is an entertaining
     courtroom drama with some good dialogue.  The script raises
     issues and then unfortunately handles them in a very
     superficial manner.  Nicholson's Colonel Jessep is so
     despicable and vile that the film bypasses a discussion of
     issues and is more the story of the slaying of a monster.
     Rating: low +1 (-4 to +4).  Very minor spoilers.

     Rob Reiner has proved himself to be a fine director, though his scripts
have occasionally been better directed than written.  His latest film has
just such problems.  A FEW GOOD MEN is his film version of Aaron Sorkin's
Broadway play with Sorkin himself writing the screenplay.  Any court martial
play invites comparison to Herman Wouk's "Caine Mutiny Court-Martial," and
in several major aspects, Sorkin's play falls short.

     Marine Pfc. William T. Santiago, stationed at Guantanamo, Cuba, just
did not measure up to the high standards set by the U.S. Marine Corps.  He
is killed in a hazing incident perpetrated by Pfc. Lawson Downey and Lance
Cpl. Harold W. Dawson.  A mis-matched set of Navy lawyers is given the task
of providing the defense in the court martial.  And over the whole idea is
the shadow of Col. Nathan Jessep (played by Jack Nicholson), who commands
the Marines at Guantanamo.  We know almost immediately that Jessep is the
source of all the evil that has taken place.  Little effort is spared in the
script to make Jessep as vile and politically incorrect as possible  The
goals of our three defense lawyers--Lt. Cmdr. JoAnne Galloway (played by
Demi Moore), Lt.(j.g.) Daniel Kaffee (played by Tom Cruise), and Lt. Sam
Weinberg (played by Kevin Pollak)--are first, to stop conflicting with each
other; second, to put together a case to help Downey and Dawson; and third,
if possible, to at the same time bring down the incredibly nasty
Col. Jessep.  The result is a fun, entertaining, Kleenex-like sort of movie
that is a long way from the classic that some critics are claiming it to be.

     While I enjoyed the film, it did not work for me as a drama for three
very strong reasons.  The first is that the three lawyers are trying to
defend two men who to better their position in the Marines were willing to
stuff a rag in a man's mouth, seal his mouth and bind him with duct tape,
and (in so doing) cause the man's death.  It is a little hard to root for
the lawyers defending them.  It is even harder to root for this team of
lawyers.  In their own way they are every bit as unprofessional as Jessep.
Kaffee and Galloway start out at each other's throats for the good reason
that neither is particularly good as a lawyer.  Cruise's Kaffee, slick and
just a bit slimy as a lawyer, is lackadaisically doing his job and prides
himself on his long list of low-effort court cases.  Moore's Galloway is
hopeless in her efforts to control Kaffee, and it is only Pollak as the
sweet, healing, wise, Jewish lawyer who is able to hold the team together.
These are flat, unengaging characters, and they are not written very well.
But the film could have survived that if Nicholson's Jessep had been better
written.

     The third complaint is in the portrayal of Jessep.  If the other
characters are flat, the disgusting Jessep is linear.  It is difficult to
believe that this tactless, rather disgusting man could be given a position
of prominence as he has been in this film.  And it is a serious mistake to
oversimplify the negative characters of the film, making them easier to
detest.  At no point do we see anything in the film from Jessep's point of
view.  How much would it compromise his character to show a little merit in
his arguments?  Bringing him down has much more dramatic impact if it is
regrettable but necessary than if it is dragon-slaying.  That brings me back
to how much better a similar story was handled in the play "The Caine Mutiny
Court-Martial" or nearly as well in the film THE CAINE MUTINY.  A FEW GOOD
MEN is a film whose conflict was asking to be fleshed out, but which
preferred not to risk having the audience agree with the wrong side.

     In the final analysis, we have a film that is entertaining without
being provocative, but is enjoyable for mindless entertainment.  From me it
gets a low +1 on the -4 to +4 scale.  I am a little surprised at the
positive critical comment it has gotten elsewhere.

					Mark R. Leeper
					att!mtgzfs3!leeper
					leeper@mtgzfs3.att.com
					Copyright 1992 Mark R. Leeper