Good film but the shouldn't have changed the ending

Rating: 7/10 (8 February 2014)

Great film with so many good points. The depiction of the harsh training for the SEALs is agonising to watch but when you see what they had to go through in combat (or even the hike in over such arduous terrain with such heavy loads) you realise why. Life with the SEALs back at base seems like an eternal frat party if everyone was an ultra-professional/competitive Olympic level triathlete with lethal combat skills. The dance scene was a little baffling although the 'Introduction/We don't care' bit was very true to life (actually I think Paton is a great dancer and very much the cliché SEAL in appearance, like something from the cover of one of those corny SEAL/SWAT romances on Amazon). The action scenes are great and super realistic although oddly I thought the scenes where they fall down the cliffs were more shocking than when they get wounded. The depiction of the Afghan villagers helping the SEALs was also good to see, so often they end up stereotyped as the bad guys, good to see that Hollywood realises there are factions and levels to Afghan society.
Personally I think they overdid the whole 'Band of Brothers' aspect but that's part of the SEAL mystique and true to the book. Some people question why the Apaches were taken away to help the army convoy but no way could you justify not sending them to help troops in actual combat because they MIGHT be needed to support the much smaller SEAL team whose mission seemed to be going OK at that point. Personally if I was in their prisoner predicament I would have taken the shepherds with me until I was able to establish comms then tied them to a tree and stabbed them all in the calf. By the time they bit through their bonds and hobbled back to the village the team would be clear. But you can't second guess the man on the ground and you have to agree with Lutterall that even that would probably have earned them criticism from certain people who either have no understanding of their situation or hypocrites who don't even want to try to empathise with those at the sharp end. It's an interesting comparison to the British SAS mission Bravo 2 Zero which also had comms difficulties and was compromised by a goatherd. The bad point of this fim is the ending which is pure Hollywood. In real life Lutterall was helped to escape into the woods by the Afghan villagers and is discovered by an army search team. In the book the Taliban attack the village and are eventually repulsed with help of the army rescue force, the heroes personally dispatching the main villains, one in hand to hand combat in the worst possible Hollywood cliché. Why they chose to do that is unfathomable, Lutterall's story is amazing enough as it is, it doesn't require any such embellishment.
Another inaccuracy is the fact that Lutterall never witnesses the rescue helicopter being shot down but that's forgivable for dramatic purposes. Some controversy arises about the number of enemies the SEALs faced, some saying hundreds, others putting it as low as single figures. As always the truth probably lies somewhere in between, the Taliban and various elements who wish to criticize the film wanting to play it down, those who wish stress the heroism of the SEALs/aircrew wanted to elaborate it.
All told excellent film, really enjoyed it.