Surprisingly better than-anticipated Michael Bay helmed production

Rating: 8/10 (21 January 2016)

13 HOURS: THE SECRET SOLDIERS OF BENGHAZI (2016) *** John Krasinski, Pablo Schreiber, James Badge Dale, David Denman, Dominic Fumusa, Max Martini, Alexia Barlier, David Costabile, Peyman Moaadi, Matt Letscher, Toby Stephens. Surprisingly better than-anticipated Michael Bay helmed production about the true life event in 2013 where the US Embassy was under attack in Libya while a covert team of security attempts to serve their duty with nothing but roadblocks, red-tape and basically a clusterf*ck of 'intelligence' and 'communications' gone haywire. Krasinski, Dale & Martini stand-out as the stalwart yet troubled men of action hampered by their knob of a boss Costabile (doughy bureaucracy personified) as all hell breaks loose. Bay manages to be somewhat restrained (ok there's a car chase and some 'splosions) yet the screenplay by Chuck Hogan, based on Mitchell Zuckoff's novel account of the battle that follows the playbook of "Black Hawk Down" : stick to the facts in spite of the rah-rah jingoistic hokum thrown in for good measure.