One of the best war films ever.

Rating: 9/10 (8 July 2004)

I find it hard to believe the incredible amount of hostility to this movie and the many criticisms of it, most of which are either absurdly nit-picking or just plain false.
It is easy to say, with the benefit of hindsight, that America's whole involvement in Vietnam was a huge mistake, but the victory of the North caused a tremendous amount of suffering, unhappiness and loss of freedom, and still does. I'm not going to comment on the politics or history of the war, because obviously a lot of other people know much more about these issues than I do. But as a piece of cinema, and as a comment on war in general, the film is superb.
Certainly the battle scenes were some of the most gruesome ever filmed. Perhaps they were over the top, but surely they are more true than the old movies where everybody died cleanly, with a minimum of pain, and frequently had time to speak their last will and testament before they signed out by closing their eyes.
What I loved was the human dimension. Some critics have complained about the depiction of men having babies just before they go to war and get killed, but the fact is that it happened. After all, these were young men, many of them were married, and it was the time of the baby boom. I loved the intercutting between the battle field and the women back home. Sure it was excessively emotional, but if you can't get emotional about the waste of lives in war, then I think you have a serious problem. It was also great to see them humanise the enemy, particularly in the bit about the man who was killed after writing a letter to his wife or girlfriend. Is this racist? Don't be absurd.
Is it propaganda? Well, it seems that if you disagree with the views expressed in a book or film, it is propaganda, while if you agree, it is honest, probing, important, etc. I certainly didn't agree with all the opinions expressed in We Were Soldiers. I think the policy of sending men to their deaths in order to bring back the bodies of those already dead is insanity, and I don't believe the use of napalm is ever justified. But this movie is not in any sense propaganda. It is possibly unrealistic in the sense that it is dramatised, not documentary, but it is a very honest portrayal of real men and women trying to cope with a real, ghastly situation.