"All wars are different,...

Rating: 10/10 (26 March 2006)

...all wars are the same." This line, spoken during the final minutes of the movie, really sums up the whole viewing experience.
The story evolves around a young man who enters the U.S. marine corps, takes part in the training, is sent to Kuwait after the Iraqi invasion 1990, and returns after the conclusion of Desert Storm. In between, he sees burning oil fields, the remains of an Iraqi family burnt to a crisp by shell fire or air-raid bombs, his friends - and he himself - losing all aspects of civilized behavior during their stay in the desert of Saudi Arabia... all in all, the usual insanity of any war.
And that is the amazing feat this movie achieves: it takes the whole war down to a personal level and concentrates on the members of this small unit. And it concentrates on their behavior and reaction during a time of stress, and of mortal danger: the machismo; the growing frustration with not being able to kill and fight, despite all the preparation; and the anger about developments at home - the unfaithful girlfriend/spouse etc.
All these frustrations mount, but they are never able to erupt; in one scene, 2 marines are told NOT to kill an enemy officer in their sights as it is a job for an air force strike. Everything they've done and been through has, for them, built up to this ONE kill, which they are now denied... and it is this, the fact that ordinary people are reduced to killers, craving this one kill that will make the whole ordeal worthwhile, that the movie brings to the viewer's attention. And it is an achievement that singles it out, and, in my opinion, puts it right up there with, to name one, "All quiet on the western front".
Which, by the way, I urge you to see back to back with this one. "All wars are different, all wars are the same."