A portray of a war

Rating: Null/10 (21 July 2003)

This is a great movie, which pictures in a sinthetic way what the Balcan's conflict was: a group of not-so-innocent-but-not-guilty-at-all people trapped between interests that go beyond their understanding... and they die from it.
The way the problem is presented is very fresh, even when the one-on-one situation is not new in the film history. The situation has been presented in an island -"Hell in the Pacific"-, and in a lone planet -"Enemy Mine"- among other films: the two opposite-sided warriors that have to overcome common troubles to survive. In this film the island/planet is a trench in the middle of a warfield somewhere in the Balcans in which, because of the stupidity of their superiors, both soldiers get trapped.
Now, the interesting side of this story is that the characters are at shooting distance of both enemy armies, and therefore at risk of dying from friendly or enemy fire. As a further complication, the believed-dead friend of one of the soldiers has been booby-trapped with a mine by the other's friend, who is shot dead early in the movie. They cannot run, for they will be shot by the other army, and the soldier lying over the mine cannot move, or it will blow appart.
The situation develops fast into a major international matter, with the not-so-fortunate intervention of the UN soldiers and, off course the international press. How can it get worst? How can it get better? The film mirrors the "well intended" actions that a Worldwide peace organization with an internal ego-war, lack of credibility, and quite unclear agenda did in the Balcan's conflict. It presents the misguided reasons by which hate led to fraticide, in which nobody remembers the origin of the conflict, but the consequences are written in blood in the papers. And also portrays the roll of the media not only as wintnesses, but also as beholders of the Public Opinion.
The story goes on with very wise and satiric, even comic dialogs inserted among very serious situations, which lead the public lightly but reflexively into the tense and very likely ending.
A great film, which with a very low budget and a very inteligent and documented script, puts itself among the best war films of all times. Only thing I hope is that the story was not based on a real-life situation, which would be by far more terrifiyng that most fiction endings in film history.