Reading the book helps

Rating: Null/10 (21 January 2002)

One of the flaws I've seen with many of the critiques of this film is that people are trying to dissect it as though they were sitting in film school. That framework doesn't apply well here. Character development? Character development would have been germain if it was a study of the effects of a modern war on those who fight it or in the greater context of how this affected foreign policy. However that was not the intent here. It was to as honestly as possible depict the events of 3 Oct 93. You can liken this more to documentary film-making than to standard Hollywood fair. If you read the book you would see that their are a mileiu of characters to keep up with. Apologies for silencing their story because it is beyond the publics ability to keep track of more than a couple characters. As to the cliches, sometimes real people speak like that. Your best friend is lying on a table about to die. What do you say to him? I doubt Shakespearean prose could easily fall from most of our lips in such a situation. Yes it was confusing and hard to keep track of. It is war. It is confusing and horrible and strangely exhilerating. The most absurd things sometimes happen in war just as they do in real life sometimes. Hell, you and your buddies are in a bad situation sometimes the only thing you can do is make a smart remark. It is almost a defense mechanism. Another point as to the absurdities of war, this isn't the first movie to point that out, suggest you look at Apocolypse Now and Full Metal Jacket again. In my humble opinion which may not be worth much, this movie rightfully deserves to stand in the pantheon of great war films. It did what it intended to do, tell a story and tell it accurately and that it did in spades.