Terrific action but not good everything else

Rating: 5/10 (20 December 2014)

During the Vietnam War, Marine Terry Childers (Samuel L. Jackson) executes a prisoner to intimidate a North Vietnamese officer into calling off an attack on his unit and thereby saving the life of Hays Hodges (Tommy Lee Jones). Years later, Hodges is retired and Childers leads a group of Marines sent to relief the embassy in Yemen. Ambassador Mourain (Ben Kingsley) is begging to evacuate and Childers loses 3 men. He orders return fire and 83 civilians are killed. National Security Adviser Bill Sokal (Bruce Greenwood) is angry and intends to make Childers the scapegoat. Childers faces court martial and he asks Hodges to defend him. Maj. Mark Biggs (Guy Pearce) prosecutes.
The first thing director William Friedkin has to decide is whether we root for Childers or not. Every step forward is followed by a step backwards. He's working at cross purposes with himself. The action scenes at the embassy are terrific. Friedkin is still at his best doing action. However he should hold those scenes for later in the movie. That way the movie can play with his guilt and innocence. Also the movie skimps on the CSI aspects. It's really questionable how everybody just skips over the snipers across the way. There were snipers but nobody cares. Also Greenwood is basically a cartoon villain. The politics is simplified to a ridiculous amount. The whole thing feels manufactured and not well done. Then the closing credits force a happy ending wrapped up in a nice little bow. That's almost as ridiculous as everything else.