More "Black Hawk Down" than "Saving Private Ryan"

Rating: 7/10 (29 December 2013)

LONE SURVIVOR (2013) **1/2 Mark Wahlberg, Taylor Kitsch, Emile Hirsch, Ben Foster, Eric Bana. Filmmaker Peter Berg's top-heavy adaptation of Marcus Luttrell's book about his involvement with a doomed mission as a SEAL Team 10 op in Afghanistan to locate a Taliban leader focuses on the quartet of soldiers (all players equally determined and stoic) sent on the patrol that goes disastrously wrong incredibly fast. More "Black Hawk Down" than "Saving Private Ryan" the film's merits are in the impossible odds while the band of brothers attempt to save one another with limited resources. The visceral violence is further impacted upon by ace make-up work from veterans Greg Nicotero and Howard Berger.