We WERE Soldiers! (We Were Soldiers (DVD))

Member Name: mmintfresh

Product:	We Were Soldiers (DVD)
Date:	21/03/02 (44 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Good film

Disadvantages: None

Mel Gibson stars as Lt.Colonel Hal Moore, a man assigned to lead his troops of the 1st of the 7th into Vietnam, a place that in the future would be called the valley of death and where, seven years earlier some French soldiers were massacred. Hal trains his men with Sergeant Major Basil Plumley(Sam Elliott) hard but treats them as his sons. He particular befriends a young soldier called Lieutenant Jack Geoghegan (Chris Klein)who has just become a father. One day he is called into combat and goes of to Vietnam to fight. Once there they will be dropped in by helicopter lead by pilot Major Bruce Crandall (Greg Kinnear). They go into battle and Moore leads his men into battle, however they under estimate the numbers of the army that awaits them or that they have just arrived at the army's base camp. One platoon runs after a spy and get ambushed. Meanwhile the rest fo the American's are slowly surrounded by the local soldiers and are killed in numbers. Meanwhile Moore's wife Julie(Madeleine Stowe) has taken on the job of informing the rest of the soldiers wives if their husbands have died. Moore is told to leave but he stays with his men intending to keep his promise that he will only leave once everyone else, dead or alive have gone.

This is probably the first war film I have ever seen, I always thought that I wouldn't like them, however I did enjoy this film. The film gets off to an explosive and quite gory start with the massacre of the French and this immediatly drew me into the film. The film then nicely the soldiers families and also their training. Then the last hour is full off battle with guns, explosions and death. This film is very gory but this isn't exploiting the situation it makes the war less Hollywood and seems more realisitc and successfully shows the true horrors of war. This film also shows the bond between the soldiers and although sometimes this film goes a bit over the top with the patriotic stuff and sometimes the who
le bit about the men being Moore's sons it does work. The film explores breifly the impact the war has on the families of the soldiers but this is done well and anymore would have been annoying. Overall I would recommend this film as it is entertaining and sometimes quite moving.

Summary: