Good war film, but needs more time on the characters

Rating: 9/10 (25 January 2002)

As I said above, Black Hawk Down is a good war film. One of the best, in fact. The action scenes (or basically the entire movie) were great, and really gave me a sense of realism. Watching it in the cinema, it is very exciting, and you might actually end up trying to dodge some of the RPGs that come flying towards you (at least, on screen). The best part is probably when the first Black Hawk goes down. However, the film's one flaw is that you never get to know any of the characters. Now, as others have said, it's realistic in that you don't get to know the soldiers in all of the chaos of war, and I stick by that. However, I want know only a tiny bit more about them, so at least I get to know who just got killed, or who just got narrowly missed by a stream of bullets. Also, I know it's based on real life, but how did the UN troops only loose 18 men when surrounded by thousands? Other than those two things, this movie is one of the best war films ever - about equal with Saving Private Ryan, I think.