One of the best USMC recruiting films ever made.

Rating: Null/10 (12 April 2001)

This review contains what some might consider spoilers.
I heard once that the script was originally written with the US Army Rangers as its backdrop, but that the army didn't want to be associated with the production. Well, I can see why - Gomer Pyle, USMC gave a truer representation of the military than this film. But that's not what bugs me about it. Cartoonish action scenes, dopey plotting, and outlandish depictions of military life have combined to make some great films. What bugs me is the complete re-writing of the pop-history of the Grenada operation.
The bit with the bulldozer? That was Army Rangers at the airfield. The unit trapped in a building by two armored vehicles? Navy Seals. The long distance call for fire? 82nd Airborne. The 'liberation' of the med school? Army Rangers again. It's bad enough that this film rolls all those events into one platoon (and don't get me started on the concept of a recon platoon with one lieutenant, one sargeant, and twenty privates), but it usurps those events from other branches of the armed forces without even crediting their existence. Thanks to this film, in twenty years the popular memory of Operation Urgent Fury will only contain the Corps.
Semper fi.