Cliche' but amusing

Rating: Null/10 (31 August 2002)

The most fascinating aspect of Hart's War was the advertising campaign. Giant I-10 billboards don Bruce Willis's stubbled face. Willis's Eastwood squint looks out from the sides of buses. Willis's name gets first billing on posters. Hart's War seems like another Bruce Willis movie. And Colin Farrell, whose name causes furrowed brows of non-recognition, is pushed to the background.
The advertising deception works, and audiences enter the theater expecting to see Die Hard On the Western Front. But what they see on the screen seems impossible. They see Colin Farrell. They see him a lot. They see him as much as Bruce Willis. Hart's War presents a unique blend of the star-vehicle and the ensemble. Willis neither overpowers the screen with a constant presence, nor does he leave his stardom in the background. A proper deus-ex-machina, Willis appears with pure persona, but then steps back and shares the spotlight with what's-his-face. Surrounded by posters advertising stars with a movie attached, Hart's War, camouflaged in the same posters, provides a slightly more refreshing product. Slightly.
Under the gaze of two enemy commanders (Willis and Marcel Iures), Lt. Tommy Hart (Farrell) defends a Tuskegee airman accused of murder. With such racial and patriotic themes abounding, the occasional cliché proverb escapes, but this is aptly countered by the historically-accurate use of the N-word.