An Incomprable Journey: from Hero to Fugative

Rating: 9/10 (1 April 2008)

Military Clerk: You have orders to report to the First Brigade.
Brandon King: Not me, I'm getting' out today.
Military Clerk: You leave on the 22nd, shipping back to Iraq. You've been Stop-Lossed.
Brandon King: With the shortage of guys and no draft, they're shipping back soldiers who's supposed to be getting' out.
Senator Orton Worrell: Your country needs you to go back. You know it's the right thing to do.
Brandon King: Sir, I've always done the right thing. And this is wrong.
Stop Loss is the incomparable journey of SSG Brandon King from Irak back home to Texas. Scenes from Irak alternate between young adult hi-jinx and bloody firefights with Haji, the locals who would send the US packing notwithstanding President Bush's dramatic declaration of victory aboard the USS Kennedy (not shown in this film) and Toby Keith's song sung off key by the GIs during respite from conflict. As cheerful as they are, even baptizing themselves in a curious mixture of Catholic and Pentacostal rites. the last fire fight with Haji takes out half the platoon and destroys all its equipment.
Back Home there's a parade and medals. After receiving a paltry Bronze Star, SSG King renders the type of rambling, disjointed speech many veterans might give to feather merchants (US civilians). Superiors upbraid him for not pitching recruiting. What does King care? He's getting out!
Boy does he have a surprise in store for him when Colonel "Boot" (Timothy Olyphant)wants to send him back yonder. "But President Bush says we won the war," protests SSG King.
This is the type of movie true supporters of the war might not like to see: the wards of amputees, the crazed survivors and the blood stained bodies of enemy civilians caught in cross-fire between the Hajis and US forces..