Flawed treatment gathers steam in second half

Rating: 7/10 (9 October 2002)

Released at the end of a decade of big Vietnam films like "Apocalypse Now," "Full Metal Jacket," and "Born On The Fourth Of July," "Casualties of War" occupies a smaller and more intimate space, almost resembling a TV movie apart from the cussing. Based on a short non-fiction account by New Yorker writer Daniel Lang, the minor-key treatment kind of works in the picture's favor, putting character before spectacle.
What doesn't work in the film's favor is surprising. Brian De Palma's a great director of suspense and action, but he stumbles early here, with a silly sequence where a trapped soldier is menaced by a Viet Cong soldier crawling slowly through a tunnel. It's a VC tunnel, so why is Charlie crawling? Just walk over and stab the guy, right? But here, and a little later with the fate of Brownie, De Palma telegraphs his punches in ham-fisted style, and the picture drags. And what's the use of hiring the greatest actor of his generation if he can't give a decent performance? Sean Penn's mannerisms are off-putting throughout. If you're going to do De Niro, okay, but at least choose whether it's going to be the guy from "Taxi Driver" or "Midnight Run."
On the other hand, Michael J. Fox is actually very good, overcoming his callow 80s cut-off-tie image with a performance of hidden depth and complexity. How do you deal with a group of fellow soldiers who set out to perform a despicable act, but whom you are bound by trust and duty? How far do you push to see justice is served, when you don't know if it can do any good?
The film gathers force and mission in the second half, with a powerful climax to the kidnapping segment and then a gripping, satisfying search for justice that features maybe the best use of a shovel in cinema history. The dialogue sometimes ODs on steroids("What happened in the field stays in the field"; "Oh, you think this is over?") and there are some awkward visual metaphors, but it holds together for repeat viewings well. I like the confrontations with Capt. Hill (Dale Dye from "Saving Private Ryan") especially.
Some liberties were taken with the book: There's no Brownie in the Lang account, nor Hatch. Diaz isn't an unwilling cherry, and he has a cousin who is in on the rape, too. Eriksson didn't try to lead the kidnap victim to safety in an unguarded moment, and Sgt. Meserve didn't save his life (he saved someone else's immediately after his crime, for which he was nominated for the Bronze Star.)
The bookend sections are weak, particularly the ending, which is so lame it makes sense the screenwriter all but disowned the work after De Palma rejected a tougher conclusion. But "Casualties" is a strong movie all the same, about more than just a war. How do we hold onto a code of morality in a world of chaos and random violence?
As Eriksson says, both in the movie and the book: "We all figured we might be dead in the next minute, so what difference did it make what we did? But the longer I was over there, the more I became convinced it was the other way around that counted - that because we might not be around much longer, we had to take extra care how we behaved."