Mel Gibson needs to make more movies as exciting and entertaining as "We Were Soldiers."

Rating: 8/10 (8 June 2008)

John Wayne would stand up in his grave and salute Mel Gibson if he saw "Braveheart" director Randall Wallace's patriotic tribute to the 1st Battalion, 7th Cavalry in "We Were Soldiers," with Madeleine Stowe, Greg Kinnear, Chris Klein, Barry Pepper, and Sam Elliot. This sentimental but adrenalin-laced Vietnam-era war saga about the first battle between the U.S. Army and uniformed North Vietnamese troopers in November 1965 eschews politics and eulogizes the valorous Americans that fell on the field of honor. Unlike the best-known Vietnam War spectacles, such as Michael Cimino's "The Deer Hunter" (1978), Francis Ford Coppola's "Apocalypse Now" (1979), Oliver Stone's "Platoon," and Stanley Kubrick's "Full Metal Jacket" (1987), all of which loudly condemned the war, "We Were Soldiers" confines its criticism to the periphery of its explosive pyrotechnics.
Nevertheless, this gritty, gung-ho, Mel Gibson, flag-waver is quietly contemptuous about this most ill-handled of American wars. When General Westmoreland wants Lieutenant Colonel Hal Moore (Mel Gibson of "The Road Warrior" with a good ole boy southern drawl) to leave the battle and debrief him miles away in Saigon, Moore simply refuses and remains alongside his men. Chiefly, "We Were Soldiers" represents the first major Hollywood combat epic to portray the North Vietnamese as flesh and blood mortals with respect and dignity. How willingly American audiences embrace this surprisingly sympathetic treatment of Ho Chi Minh's minions will determine the success of "We Were Soldiers" at the box office as well as its overall role in healing our national wounds.
"The Man in the Iron Mask" scenarist-turned-director Randall Wallace based his old-fashioned but cliché-cluttered combat screenplay on the 535-page, non-fiction best-seller by Lieutenant General Hal Moore (Ret.) and war correspondent Joseph Galloway entitled "We Were Soldiers and Young." Opening in 1954, "We Were Soldiers" shows the wily North Vietnamese Army ruthlessly wiping out French troops in the Ia' Drang Valley, a.k.a. 'The Valley of Death.' "If you kill all they send, NVA commander, Lt. Col. Nguyen Huu An (Don Duang of "Three Seasons") contends, "they will stop coming." Eventually, the French stopped coming. The U.S. military followed in their ill-fated footsteps eleven years later. The rugged terrain of Vietnam prompted Pentagon strategists to deploy troops by helicopter. They picked Lt. Col. Hal Moore, a Harvard graduate with an International Relations degree, to command the newly redesigned Airborne, 7th Cavalry. The first half of "We Were Soldiers" follows Moore as he acclimates his troops to helicopters. He instills in one young officer, Second Lieutenant Jack Geoghegan (Chris Klein of "Rollerball"), the importance of caring for his men. Veteran Sergeant-Major Basil Plumley (scene-stealing Sam Elliot of "Dog Watch"), who prefers his reliable .45 automatic pistol to the new M-16 assault rifle, shadows Moore.
Flying Moore's men into combat is ace chopper pilot Major Crandall (Greg Kinnear of "As Good As It Gets") in his best ever action role. Wallace provides glimpses of Moore's home life with his wife Julie (Madeleine Stowe of "Bad Girls") and their five rambunctious children. Inevitably, when President Johnson orders them into action, our heroesall 395 of them-wind up in the Valley of Death pitted against 4000 NVA regulars during a devastating three day engagement. The bullet-riddled second half of "We Were Soldiers" climaxes in Vietnam with savage hand-to-hand combat.
Covering ground similar to Ridley Scott's superb "Black Hawk Down," "We Were Soldiers" boasts not only more heart and soul, but it also exhibits bouts of grisly violence. Mel Gibson needs to make more movies as exciting and entertaining as "We Were Soldiers."