An underrated masterpiece ......

Rating: 9/10 (19 April 2011)

I like war films when done well. Platoon was fantastic and I'm gonna put Casualties of War right up there with that multi-Oscar winner. That may sound a little haughty from me – but this film is deserving of such an accolade. The story is harrowing, the material itself shocking at times – but the overall result is a masterpiece.
I won't go into the plot details here in this review as it has been well covered at this stage but I will go into certain specific elements of the movie.
Acting: Fox is fantastic here – never better. Fox is a good actor anyway, we all know that, but I feel he does not get the credit he deserves sometimes. To some he will always be Marty McFly from the BTTF movies (to be honest he will be to me too) but he really puts in a great shift in this flick. His naturalistic, everyman style makes you want to root for him no matter what. He carries the film in my view as the only true upstanding character in the army who sticks by his beliefs no matter what. Actually – the fact that this incident took place in the Vietnam war is a side issue if you ask me – it could have happened anywhere at any time. It is truly about humanity's morality as opposed to being about a war or those who took part in it. But for me – Fox is terrific.
Penn is brilliant too. An angry, tobacco chewing 20-year old Sarge – dumped in a world of pain and suffering. You can see his motivations and where the frustrations have caused him to carry out the horrible act in the film. Penn is another brilliant actor in my view – in so far as whenever I see him, I believe he 'is' the character and not just 'acting' as that character. Here is the ultimate proof of his abilities. Some reviewers say that he 'overacts' a little here – but to me it is simply his intensity.
The girl who plays the rape victim - Thuy Thu Le - is also terrific. A true testament of finding a talent out there without a background of acting who can turn in a performance amongst the best that Hollywood can offer. It's such a pity that this film was her one and only performance.
The rest of the cast varies a little. Erik King as Brownie hams it up a little in a couple of scenes (just look at his facial expressions as the unit walks into a Vietnamese village for pure contortion) but does well in others (when he gets shot). Don Harvey as Clark is a parody of a evil persona within the movie – an OTT performance. John C Reilly is okay. Ving Rhames is okay. Leguizamo is good as the conflicted Diaz. Dale Dye is terrific – intense and totally believable, his one-on-one with Fox superb.
Cinematography: De Palma's style runs through this movie like a river. He is a genius. The angles he uses (Fox's chat with Dye), the foreground/background shots (When Fox is traumatized from Brownie's shooting in the foreground and the background shows the villagers helping the VC soldier to escape), the courtroom scene (where we see the accused soldiers one by one and only ever hear the prosecutor), the long tracking shots (Basecamp Wolf) and the superb Leone-like close ups (Fox in the rain) are all beautiful. And there is so much more also – VC tunnels, burned out fields, the kidnapping itself, another background/foreground shot when the girl is stabbed – that are used to tremendous effect. The brutal nature of the story and the action is still magnificently displayed through a masterclass of cinema-making techniques from a truly gifted director.
The screenplay, music, production values are all top notch and the story rattles along at a nice pace. This is a movie in which anyone who was remotely involved in it could be extremely proud. Well done all.
9/10 – I deducted the point for the sometimes ropy acting of some of the periphery characters and for one emotional speech from Fox which was simply too preachy and overlong.