Flawed, but good performances save it

Rating: Null/10 (21 May 2001)

"Rules of Engagement" is certainly a flawed movie--not a flawed masterpiece, but still there's enough here to recommend.
The flaws are pretty easy to identify--at better than two hours, it's too long, and yet the resolution seems tacked on. There are too many superfluous scenes--and when you use child actors, it has to be done deftly or it's an invitation to eye rolling. Hence Ben Kingsly, as the weakling Ambassador to Yemen, puts in a good performance, but his young son should have been left out entirely.
In addition, the Court rooms scenes suffer from the usual Hollywood problems--they mangle actual court procedure, though in a military court it's harder to know. Though here you don't have the bad guy explaining in excrutiatingly ludicrous detail how he's really guilty (a la Perry Mason and "A Few Good Men").
But having said all that, this is a pretty strong movie. For those who seem to think this an anti-Islamic movie, maybe they should take in some old footage showing Iranian mobs sacking the American embassy in 1979. The context is pretty convincing. And the basic question, as to why Sam Jackson fired at the protesting crowd, isn't really answered until mid way through the movie--providing some tension, though it still begs the question as to why it took them so long to fire back at all those snipers cutting them up.

This is hardly a jingoistic propaganda piece, though it might seem that way to some of the more extreme anti-American types. It has a familiar set of bad guys--the politicians looking for a fall guy, also somewhat depressingly convincing. The movie would have been vastly improved by some better editing and some filling of plot holes, but all said, a strong showing. By the way, I thought the beginning sequence set in Vietnam helped define and set the context for Jackson's character and his relation to Tommy Lee Jones. And bravo to the writers and director for totally ignoring the fact that Jackson happens to be black. It made no difference in how the movie progressed, a refreshing attitude. It allowed you to see Jackson, a very able actor, as simply an American Marine.