Good flick but not Woo's best.

Rating: Null/10 (16 June 2002)

Windtalkers was indeed a good movie. Personally, it hits the middle of the road on my path to greatness. One of the biggest problems with Windtalkers is that John Woo tried to combine a real, life-like war movie, with his standard brand of extravagant explosions and amazing gun fights. Those two combinations don't mix. While you are watching, you get the feeling that Woo wanted to put in choreographed gunfights that make your jaw drop, but cut short of amazing you in order to capture the realism of war (despite the large amount of shots coming from rifles with only 5 or 6 shots in the bandolier). The worst part of the movie is that it never grabbed my attention. I couldn't keep my eyes glued to the screen like i did with The Bourne Identity.
Other than those facts, the movie was good. The story was a bit stagnant and didn't flow too well but the acting more than made up for it. Nic Cage played the part of the reluctant hero who doesn't care about anything but making up for his screw up perfectly. You believe that he is really ready to die. Adam Beach did very well as the Navaho code-talker who has a sort of naivety about his situation until Cage kills his fellow code-talker as part of his orders (Beach goes war-nuts at this point and becomes a psycho soldier hell bent on revenge...muy believable).
All in all, it is a good night at the movie but i doubt it will go down as one of the best war movies ever. Unfortunately, John Woo has never made a movie better than the classic Hard-Boiled but he is getting close.