Adequate war movie with terribly clunky dialogue...

Rating: 7/10 (12 November 2019)

This movie was a boiler-plate but satisfactory action movie, though weighed down by a poorly written, terribly constructed, and woodenly acted script, with some dialogue so clunky, I could almost see the words land on the ground with a thud as soon as they left the actors' mouths. It's filled with a cavalcade of young, nubile Hollywood hunks (Nick Jonas, Ed Skrein, Keean Johnson, Darrin Criss), as well as a smattering of grizzly veterans (Dennis Quaid, Woody Harrelson) and an openly gay actor (Luke Evans) successfully playing against type, and while it was just this side of jingoistic, it didn't demonize the Japanese as much as it could have. We probably enjoyed it more than we might have, having just watched the episode in the Netflix WWII docuseries about the battle. Definitely not the best war movie I've ever seen, but enjoyable enough so as not to be completely wretched (damning with faint praise, I know).