Black Hawk Down
Director: Ridley Scott
Year Released: 2001
Rating: 2.0
Eerily similar in its plot construction to The Perfect Storm (and even features one of that picture's cast members): give brief introductory setup for each and every character, allowing them to have one and only one 'unique' trait aside from being a soldier (one loves his family, one's an artist, one's a comedian), and then have them blown to pieces in the most graphic way for the next hour and forty-five minutes. Visuals a plus (Scott's almost always got that one down), but offers little in terms of purpose - if its goal is to praise these men's heroic deeds, I'm not sure you're honoring the dead by replaying their (graphic) death scenes. If the goal is to discuss the political side of the affairs, a few text blocks are not enough. If it's an indictment of war, I think that's been covered before; if its final ten minutes of milking sympathy out of young men dying is supposed to make the violence acceptable, I am not convinced.
