5 Days of War

Plot synopsis:
In this intensely human portrayal of courage under fire, acclaimed director Renny Harlin (Die Hard 2, Cliffhanger) combines heart pounding action with real human drama, as he tells the riveting story of a war reporter caught behind enemy lines during the 2008 Russian invasion of Georgia. As a nation fights for its very survival, a brave and passionate coalition of international reporters and local Georgians risk their lives to tell the true human cost of military conflict. Filmed for six weeks on location, 5 DAYS OF AUGUST is a riveting, suspenseful portrait of the courage under fire. His spirit broken after an Iraqi ambush in Bagdad takes the life of close friend Miriam Eisner (Heather Graham), American war correspondent, Thomas Anders (Rupert Friend), seeks escape from the ghosts of his past. Rumors of war draw him to a military hot zone in the republic of Georgia, on the eve of a Russian invasion. Reunited with a small, intrepid band of war reporters in the Georgian capital of Tbilisi, Anders takes his cameraman and fellow road-warrior, Sebastian (Richard Coyle), on the road north, toward the breakaway republic of South Ossetia, just in time to witness a Russian airstrike on the peaceful village of Vaziani. While Russian bombs rain down, Anders and Sebastian boldly document the devastation, then shuttle survivors to a military hospital in Gori, with the help of a brave and beautiful, Georgian school teacher, named Tatia (Emmanuelle Chriqui). Unable to break his story through the noise of Russian propaganda and a world distracted by the Olympics in China, Anders and Sebastian race back to the battle zone to help a desperate Tatia find her missing family. Caught in the crossfire of full-scale combat and witness to the murder of civilians in another Russian assault, Anders records the evidence that will shock the world. But before he can act, Anders is captured, along with Sebastian and Tatia, by the architects of these atrocities, the ruthless Colonel Demidov (Rade Serbedjiza) and his mercenary killer, Daniil (Mikko Nousiainen). Just when all seems lost they are rescued in a daring raid by a Georgian soldier, Captain Rezo (Johnathon Schaech). Anders and his friends, including the world-weary Dutchman (Val Kilmer), must stand and fight for their freedom and their cause in a final battle in the city of Gori. Ultimately, while President Saakashvilli (Andy Garcia) seeks help from his allies, Anders faces one last test of courage as he strives to save Tatias life by sacrificing everything but the truth.

Tags: violence, murder

Review:
The War between Georgia and South Ossetia/Russia in August of 2008 would seem to be a great background to a well-plotted, carefully crafted film that captures all the intrigue of the Caucasus.
5 Days of War is a twisted train wreck of special effects laden action and blatant propaganda with a parade of terrible acting.
About 40 minutes into the film I realized I was watching a $20,000,000 piece of pro-Georgian anti-Russian propaganda.
Special effects are strong, location looks beautiful but the storyline and fact every major character is played by an American or British actor and not native Georgians/Russians is thoughtless and insulting (insulted again).
As the movie admits, truth is the first casualty of war propaganda films ...
Directed by Renny Harlin and financed by the Georgian government, this drama is a Russian-bashing screed about the 2008 South Ossetia war and the events leading to it.
The movie revolves around the experiences of two news reporters Thomas Anders (Rupert Friend) and Sebastian Ganz (Richard Coyle) who accept an assignment in Tbilisi, Georgia, a year after their previous assignment together in Iraq ended badly: the two men were rescued by a Georgian military unit in that country after their car was ambushed by militants.
Anders and Ganz's noses for news (and trouble) get them fired upon while watching a wedding at a rural Georgian inn, avoiding capture while witnessing and filming atrocities by Russian troops who have invaded the country, and ending up as prisoners of a Russian general (Rade Serbedzija).
The plot's emphasis on safeguarding the memory stick that holds Ganz's images and the Russians' attempt to destroy it leaves no room for character development with the result that Anders, Ganz and their fellow journalists end up perpetuating old World War Two stereotypes about Russian soldiers torturing and killing people, raping women and torching farms and properties with flamethrowers.
(Such stereotypes admittedly are based on fact: Soviet soldiers did act barbarically towards German civilians in the 1940s, partly as a result of the debased culture in the Soviet armed forces that arose after the purges of high-ranking military officers in the 1930s as ordered by Soviet leader Joseph Stalin, a Georgian native - what irony.) As the movie carries on, hackneyed plot twists appear: Tatia's family is riven apart by internal betrayal, Ganz is threatened with torture by the Russian general's sadistic enforcer (Nikko Mousiainen), an attempt to broadcast Ganz's images fails when the reporters are targeted by a Russian helicopter, and Ganz is hurt in the helicopter attack.
Andy Garcia as Georgian president Mikheil Saakashvili gives the best performance, endowing his character with a dignity the real person probably doesn't deserve: before the 2008 war, Saakashvili had been criticised for the use of brutal police force against protesters in an anti-government demonstration, and for declaring a state of emergency and suppressing press freedoms as a result of the protests, in November 2007.
A church used as a refuge gives the film crew opportunities to photograph pictures of religious icons and the wedding scene featured early in the movie gives a little insight into Georgian customs, traditional dress styles and folk dances.
Curiously there are no native Georgian actors in the film's major and minor acting roles; Georgians are present only as extras.By lapsing into an action-movie rut the film fails to give a near-accurate portrayal of the work news journalists do and the problems they face in unusual and intense situations where disinformation, propaganda and fear replace speech and press freedoms.
The Georgian armed forces are portrayed as decent and heroic, the Russians as cruel, barbaric and even criminal: in truth, both sides were guilty of over-reaction to provocation with Georgia attacking South Ossetia first with heavy firepower and both Georgians and Russians alike committing grave war crimes.
This is in fact a propaganda movie, so much so it uses the actual Georgian Army as "actors" for this film and using only Georgians as sources for the script.But with that aside, can it be considered a good movie regardless of it's fictional re-writing of history?
Sadly this is also no, it has direct to DVD written all over it, If it hadn't been filmed in Georgia, using Georgian soldiers giving it a authentic look it would have nothing standing this movie up.I'll end this on a quote from Anna Neistat who works for "amnesty international" "This film portrays Russians and Ossetians as barbaric beasts and Georgians as peace angels." I couldn't sum it up any better Anna..
But as this scene fades into the next it appears the film changed director to one who watched to much A team and any 1960's World war II film.For a film that purports to be a vision of real life events the director could not have got it more wrong.
Andy Garcia does his best Borat impression while the most shocking element of all is how much Val Kilmer has let himself go.If you want to watch a brutal, raw and realistic film on the horrors of war, watch the first scene and then turn your TV off.
So pick it up from bargain bin, but don't expect too much.6 stars I give are for 2 reasons: Awesome camera work (it felt like live action at places) and the fact that despite being incredibly dumb, this movie IS entertaining...
but a primitive story is too much of one-sided pro-Georgian propaganda.Good Georgians, bad Russians and nothing in the middle.
WEll, some people saying that this movie is propaganda and captured by anti-Russian federation but, I'm from Georgia from that little country.
However, the whole idea of the movie is too plain "Georgians are good, and Russians are bad"...
Georgian president gave the order to slaughter "his own people" on the night before Olympic games started:http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8281990.stmhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2008_South_Ossetia_warWatch the classics "Saving Private Ryan", "Tears of the sun", "We were soldiers"...P.S.: the scene with wedding is well described here http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2002/jul/02/afghanistan.lukeharding.
Persuading people the wrong way.Georgia and Russia both committed several atrocities in the time of the war.
The film makes it look like Georgia was minding its own business and the big, bad Russians just decided to blow the hell out of everything Georgian.
Anders meets a young Georgia woman named Tatia (Chriqui) and another reporter named Sebastian (Coyle) where they must learn to survive during the war.It seems 5 Days of War is less concerned with actuality and being an informative piece of work, and instead tries to be a gritty action film.
Alas, nothing but utter silence followed by increasing restlessness and dreariness.At the very end, the film goes sentimental and right before the end credits we see many people who've lost relatives in the five day war between the feuding countries holding pictures of their loved ones and honoring them respectably.
Think about it; you watch an empty, mundane war film that is absent of emotional elements only to be tested for tears one more time before the credits role showing people who have lost their loved ones in the same event.
Many movies have been made about many wars and we all know that most likely none of them portrayed the exact true events.
I found this picture to be a rather good action film, very authentic from the "War" point of view.
Thats whats happened, the People in crowed are REAL people in the film that survived the war, The WEDDING SEEN was based on True Story and reporters dies in this war.Andy Garcia was Awesome in his role.
All who studied thoroughly history of Russian-Georgian war would find movie to be not just good, but absolutely needed as even now Russian Federation continues to do everything possible to hide what they did to Georgia in 2008.
I personally think that these people still live in bunkers that were built in the era of the cold war, which ended 20 years as.The first phrase namely "the war is suffering Pravda" has no relation to the reality and does not apply to any version of Georgia either the U.S. or Russia, there was a need to focus attention on the fact that all Russian villains, namely to kill the innocent, to shoot through kneecap grandmothers, and stealing children 3 wheeled Bicycle with microwaves and TVs from the seventies.I never Saw the Army of Russia which would entirely consisted of Vakhabites, and walked in jeans, well this is probably one of the most small discrepancies...The Russians Bombed the wedding, of course, comes from weddings all evil, and they have a strategic importance.Who am I to challenge the opinion of creators who made the film to justify the actions of Georgia and the U.S. TroopsThe film is created with one aim, hatred, and development of Russophobia those who have watched it.
"We came here to cover a war, if we don't get a story this will all unfold unseen." This is an emotional and sometimes tense movie about reporters in Georgia during the war with Russia.
The movie is definitely pro-Georgia.While this is the story that I heard, I figure that to the people in the battlegrounds, there was no difference between the Georgian and Russian armies.
No not really, nobody reads these reviews anyway , but this movie is a real credit to Harlin,,,hes come a long way from Ford Fairlaine....and long kiss goodnight (despite the special effects Goodnight had,, also applause for Sam jack,,)Harlin shows us, his image, direction, emotion and meanings plus factual situations left unexplored of a powerful nation.
Movie is good with all actions and special effects, part about refugees is true and of course its true that Russians are wrong in this war starting from 1989, they started this war to punish Georgia for wanting independence from USSR and since than every 3-5 years Russians are killing Georgians inside Georgian territory.
Unfortunately even here you feel strong work of Russian propagandists writing clear lies about this conflict and over criticizing this movie, same time they already made not one, several movies with much more propaganda and very poor quality in every way.
It looked like a commercial for some travel agency, with only "Visit Georgia" message missing from the scene and was most tasteless thing I've ever seen in a film.
It looked like a commercial for some travel agency, with only "Visit Georgia" message missing from the scene and was most tasteless thing I've ever seen in a film.
For a war movie, this was one of the best I've seen in regards to story and special effects.
Movie starting with Russians attacked,But reality it was different and it changed whole history about this war,Expected more than killing scenes from this movie, something historical and cause of the war something, but whole movie is showing massacre and all time blaming Russian side without proof and reason ...Better read some documentary instead watching this movie, movie should be replaced - Israeli and Palestine if director wanted to show about terrorism Better suite the story of movie.Really don't understand how it has got 5points vote, may be all Georgians gave 10points for the movie but all knows it's totally different from history and that 5points is just a waste of time for the audience to suggesting this horrible movie....
Based on true events, this intense film is a vivid account of a renegade American journalist, his cameraman and a local woman caught behind enemy lines, and determined to not only survive, but tell the world what was happening, during the swift but devastating 5-day war between Russian and the Georgian Republic in 2008.Best thing Renny has done for years.
The story line contains romance, good character development and plenty of action, but the stark reality of war maintains a dominant impact throughout the film.
This story gives the viewer some insight into the Georgian perspective of events regardless of how the Russian military sees it.War is just horrific regardless of right or wrong..
Heather Graham and Val Kilmer don't have substantial material to work with (specially Graham, whose screen-time isn't any longer than two or three minutes), while Andy García made me laugh with his ridiculous Russian accent.In conclusion, 5 Days of War is worthy of a slight recommendation, because it didn't bore me and the action scenes are good.
A Nutshell Review: 5 Days of War. Five Days of August has been renamed Five Days of War outside of Georgia (despite the print at the start of the end credits proudly displaying the former), undoubtedly capitalizing on its predominant war fighting segments to help market the film, based upon real incidents that took place during the 2008 Russo-Georgian War during the said period in which parts of Georgia got occupied by the Russians, shrewdly planned during the time when the rest of the world was distracted by the Beijing Olympics.
As with most openings this segment was important to establish character motivations, to showcase and set the audience expectations that no stops will be pulled to feature military hardware, as well as to touch upon its political subplot that while Georgia had joined and volunteered to the USA's coalition of the willing in the Iraqi campaign, the reverse isn't so true when Georgia herself required help from the West in which she's trying to align herself to, irking the Russians whose waning influence had triggered an invasion in August 2008 (or so the film will have it put).With a potential war brewing, Anders and Sebastian find their way to Georgia, and as the trailer would have outlined the plot already, get caught up in a wedding and picked up some locals including Tatia (Emmanuelle Chriqui in a role to look pretty and contribute nothing more), getting some incriminating footage from the spoils of war and the inhumane crimes against humanity committed by Russian mercenaries contracted for handsome sums to lead the invasion, and spend the entire second half of the film protecting the yet to be uploaded evidence on a memory card.
Not to mention soldiers and crack forces too, with an incredibly lean and thin platoon supporting our protagonists from point to point, appearing when called upon for plot conveniences which took the shine off a narrative, making the second half of the film very much like a standard war action flick with one side seen to be winning little skirmishes.
It's very obvious propaganda through and through.Still it served up enough to play out like an average war film, highlighted with a fairly wobbly focus on journalists and the risk and sacrifices they have to go through in order to bring the best coverage from conflict zones.
5 DAYS OF WAR is a disturbing film on many levels; it takes us into the bowels of an active war zone sharing the bloody ravenous hunger of war and the effects on the citizens of the invaded country, it is raw in its depiction of what happens to non-combatant journalists who are embedded to document the truth, and it is embarrassing how little the outside world knew of this brief but devastating war between Russia and Georgia in 2008 a war concomitant with the Olympic Games in Beijing, China so hungrily observed by the media.
The other is an excellent Action War Movie that is about Journalists embedded deep in the Horror.The Film is excellent, engaging, exciting and has its Heart in the right place.
One of the most Russophobic films in recent years was called into being by just another coil of confrontation between the Russian under empire and the Western superpower lead largely by the US, which started just from the Russian-Georgian war and is at its peak right now, when the army of the vast Ukraine, rather than of tiny Georgia, is serving its purpose.
We Russians dislike such a film as 'war crimes' and 'mercenraries' are considered to be bad things and working for 'Russophobic propaganda', to be public enemy.
The Georgian Army was outgunned and outmanned, and none of us knew exactly how to handle it.This movie was shot in current day Georgia and follows several newsmen through their initial exploration, their capture, their final yielding to overwhelming force, and their release by a philosophical mercenary leader, Rade Serbedzija, who gives one of the best performances in the film.
As story came down to a purelly propaganda movie(Georgian been the true Freedom fighters,and not mass murders of their own peoples or South Ossetians.
For the normal viewer this may not matter much, but the action scenes are well (sometimes too well) choreographed.Now as for the film's handling of its source material (the 2008 Georgia- Russia war over South Ossetia and Abkhazia), make no mistake about it, this is a textbook example of propaganda film.
Some of the more obvious propaganda shots do tend to take away from the film a bit (people getting gunned down in classic slow motion), but all in all, if you realize what you are watching....So, take it for what it is, a very loose patriotic Georgian "interpretation" of the 2008 war.
Yet this time those personal connections are lost along the way, giving way to the political aspect of the story.The Georgians that were close to the conflict will feel emotional towards the movie and will relate in some way.
This movie is a 113- minute long insult to everyone portrayed in it - the population of South Ossetia, Russians, Georgians, the militaries of both countries, the EU, the NATO and the viewer.
Given the poor quality of the acting and writing I'd doubt anyone on both sides of the war will appreciate this movie - it may even be very offensive to some on both the Russian and Georgian sides.There's even cheesier music to go along with everything.
But it is strictly out of place in a war movie, and Harlin makes it feel more like a video game.
Now another action film director has made a bad war movie.
Right from the get-go the main focus of this movie was to make the US-supported Georgia look like angels while the Russians and Ossetians were basically "blood-thirsty beasts".