Simply ghastly. And far from 'harmless fun'.

Rating: 2/10 (29 January 2008)

I belatedly caught this epic turkey on UK television. Americans, if you insist on making this kind of jingoistic, brain dead rubbish please don't export it - it just confirms all our worse prejudices about your fine nation. I can only assume this was made to appeal to (not especially bright) 13 year old boys. Barely a minute went by without a groan of disbelief passing my lips. So much money spent on such a pile of steaming cack. Played for crude laughs this horror of a film also had a revealing line in minority stereotyping that nicely reflects, it seems, the current ideology in the US: blacks are sexy, hip heroes, Jews are cuddly, comic figures and gays are pseudo-female cowards. How can a major studio get away with such gross, offensive nonsense? However, the greatest irony comes in the scenes set in Iraq, where friendly Iraqis are fighting shoulder to shoulder with both Israel and Uncle Sam! Truly mind blowing and a telling insight into a mentality that no doubt lead to a rather different American involvement in the deserts of Iraq a few years later. Maybe George W Bush based his foreign policy on this film; it would explain an awful lot. However, one thing is reassuring - the large number of Americans on this site who find this stinker as risible as the rest of us.