A Very Foggy War

Rating: 6/10 (5 November 2005)

"The Rules of Engagement" got some pretty crummy external reviews, but it's not that bad.
The performances are all quite good. Guy Pearce was nailed for his American accent but I don't know why. He comes across as somebody whose regional dialect was subject to some New York City gestation. Let's give him some credit. The Brits used to stick to Southern accents (viz., Scarlett O'Hara, Blanche DuBois) but have lately become more discriminating (viz., Daniel Day-Lewis in "Gangs of New York"). It's a big improvement over the generic American dialect that Russel Crowe and Charlize Theron come up with.
Where was I? Oh, yes. The combat scenes are well done. They owe a great deal to "Saving Private Ryan" of course. Every combat scene in every movie for the next decade or so will owe a lot to Private Ryan, in particular the abundance of bloody wounds and the sound of bullets clanking off metal surfaces.
The locations are well chosen and the photography is up to professional par.
If there is a weakness it's in the script. The Tommy Lee Jones character is presented to us as a drunk or a former drunk, but nothing comes of it. By the end he seems to have found the kind of redemption that all drunks find at the end of uplifting movies, except for Paul Newman in "The Verdict," who loses faith in friendship even as he finds redemption in good deeds. And he sensibly keeps on drinking.
There's a fight between the two macho Marines -- Jones and Jackson -- the point of which eludes me. We really don't need a brawl between two middle-aged men to pump up the middle section of the film.
The courtroom scene reeks of drama largely because the director has decided it should. People stand up in the witness box and shout angrily at the pesky prosecutor and admit things they shouldn't just because they're enraged. And there is a touching scene at the end, in which Jackson and a former enemy exchange salutes, but it's corny and there is triumphant music swelling in the background, all by the numbers.
I should mention something else that became more clear on second viewing. At the beginning of "The Green Berets" -- an atrocious John Wayne movie about Vietnam -- a civilian reporter seems to accuse Col. Wayne of militarism. "You been in Vietnam?", asks Wayne. No. "Ah-HUH," comments Wayne dismissively. A sharp contrast is thereby drawn between the characters we are to meet -- those who have been there and those who have not. A similar distinction is made in this movie, and in the most simple-minded way. There are three strata. From the top downward: (1) the heroic men who have been in combat; (2) the well-meaning Marines who haven't; and (3) the lying, perjuring, evidence-destroying suits who have no principles and are out only to further their own careers.
Yet, it's a thought-provoking mature movie in a way that, say, "A Few Good Men" was simply not. I would give "Saving Private Ryan" a higher rank because of its originality. Nothing in "The Rules of Engagement" is particularly clear cut. Jackson's character does order his men to fire on civilians, including women and kids, who are firing at him, and the firing from the crowd is covered up by the politicians who want to bury the guy so that the good old USA doesn't have to take the blame for all those deaths. But Jackson is given a good line. "That's not murder. It's COMBAT." Sometimes these days it gets a little difficult to distinguish combat from murder, and one of the reasons this movie may irritate some viewers is that the military comes off as both brave and honorable, if not exactly flawless. These Marines are gung ho, reasonably intelligent, and capable of remorse. I would guess there are many people who prefer the kind of idiot played by Jack Nicholson in "A Few Good Men," a sadistic, perjuring, stupid, male chauvinist pig. "A Few Good Men" is a more satisfying movie if you're into self righteousness and anti-militarism.
Marines and military people in general tend towards a certain set of common attitudes but there is as much diversity among them as in any other subculture, except maybe devotees of panjandrums of the more extreme stripe. The Marines whom I taught at Camp Lejeune were as bright, curious, and industrious as any students at the nearby University of North Carolina.
We all know what we would have done if we'd been Jack Nicholson. We wouldn't have done what he did. We'd have been legal and moral. But this movie asks a different question. What would we have done if we'd been in Jackson's boots? No easy answers there, though the ending kind of betrays the message that the movie itself carries.
I should add that it seems to be rare to "hang anybody out to dry" for making mistakes in combat. A week before this note was entered, Doctors Without Borders accused US forces of deliberately attacking its hospital in Afghanistan, as a top US commander said the deadly air strikes were a mistake. The hospital, also known as Médecins Sans Frontières, claims its medical facility in Kunduz was "deliberately bombed" three days ago, killing at least 22 people. General John Campbell said he could not provide more details about what happened, including who may have failed to follow procedures for avoiding attacks on hospitals. He said he must await the outcome of multiple investigations. "Await the outcome of multiple investigations."