lousy

Rating: Null/10 (23 May 2002)

Saw an advance screening of this movie a few days ago. I love war movies and I was looking forward to this one, but unfortunately it is simply lousy in all regards. This is basically a "Rambo" movie set in WWII, complete with glorified combat sequences (so glorified that they are almost offensive). There are spectacular fireballs and endless, absurd images of Nick Cage machine gunning dozens of soldiers without getting a scratch. The windtalking (codebreaking) should have been the central focus of the story and this could have been fascinating; as it turns out, we barely understand the significance of the work the Navajos did, and the Navajo characters are for the most part banal, dumbly grinning shells of characters. You will learn a lot more about the windtalkers from reading articles about this film than you will from the film itself. That is pathetic. This movie does nothing to honor the Navajo codebreakers. A good script, good acting, and involving storytelling might have been a decent honor, but they are nowhere to be found here.