Here's my take on the flick.
I do not have a military background, so please correct me if my complaints stem from ignorance of military ground procedure.
I have to say I was severely disappointed with this movie. I love Mel and his courage to stick with his values in a valueless movie industry. I loved Braveheart (in my top 10) and liked The Patriot although I thought it had script flaws and suffered a bit too much emotional glurge in addition to pulling out too many movie cliches.
But We Were Soldiers goes over the glurge barrier. To be effective at showing the emotional and psych impact of the carnage of combat does not require showing every character's family back home. It almost got to the point that if a character had an emotional fairwell at the beginning, you knew he was probably going to get killed later on. The opening scenes of Saving Private Ryan do not show the families and homefronts of the men being mowed down by German machine guns, but it is much more effectively executed in my opinion.
None of the battle scenes in this movie even approach the effectivess or polish of Ryan, Blackhawk Down, or Apocalypse Now.
I doubled over with disbelief at the scene where the soldiers get off the Hueys and see a scout and start immediately start running after him into unknown territory. I'm not a combat veteran, and this very well may be the way things happened in the Valley of Death, but it seems foolish to charge after someone into enemy territory blindly. That reeks of setup and ambush to me. It turned out to be an ambush and cut off the soldiers on the Knoll. If I could see this coming, I feel that the trained soldiers should have seen it coming, especially since military intel had absolutely no idea how many enemies were in the area.
The other thing I had a problem with was Sam Elliot's character. Yeah, I liked his bad-a** old man characterization, but would a veteran soldier (of all 4 WW2 air drops for that matter) really refuse a rifle to stand by his 1911 alone?
My other problem was the way Mel Gibson's character kept standing up straight in the midst of heavy enemy fire. Even after a bullet scaped his backpack, he still didn't take cover. Is this the way things are done?
And wouldn't Greg Kinnear's character get court marshaled for pulling a gun on an a fellow officer? That scene hit the sour note of unbelievability for me. But hey, I guess that might be the way it really happened.
My last gripe is probably just from my own ignorance, because I have no idea what the real Ia Drang Valley looks like; but didn't it seem that they were filming the battle scenes in rural California? It didn't look like Vietnam to me from the reading and research I've done. I looked up the filming location on the IMDB and indeed I found the filming locations to be all stateside. This seemed to be reminiscent of The Green Berets with John Wayne where they tried to depict Vietnam by filming in Georgia(!). It seems that a big budget movie like this could have afforded to film in the Phillipines (like Apocalypse Now) or Central America (like Predator).
That's my two cents, and I do not mean in any way to disrespect the soldiers who fought in the Ia Drang Valley or in any other combat for that matter. This is just my opinion of the film alone, and I just felt that it didn't live up to cinema's greatest war films.
One more small gripe. I see that someone here remarked about how great the DVD clarity of the film was. On this I have to seriously disagree. I thought the digital transfer was terrible. It was not sharp IMO and was very grainy, but not in an intentionally grainy way, like
Saving Private Ryan's intentionally newsreel grainy look. For an example of this, just check out the scene in Mel Gibson's house where Madeline Stown peeks around the corner at her husband while he's going over the reason's for the French Defeat. You can see pixelization and digital artifacts all around her body.
Check out Apocalypse Now: Redux and Blackhawk Down for excellent and amazingly sharp digital transfers.
...ALOHA Gun Runner.
...Thank You, at least for using your head and sharing your feelings with us about the first combat film ever made that actually HEALS Veterans, as per the Veterans themselves. It works for them.
...May I share what my experiences
were in the Central Highlands of a then Free South Vietnam of 1965 in answering your questions...?
...First, this 'Braveheart in 'Nam Motion Picture correctly depicts the best way for US to win at war now ..by taking care of each other on the battlefield and at home in a new -Time of War- with an Enemy that is now Within BIG TIME.
...The opening of .."SAVING PRIVATE RYAN".. shows combat carnage in staccato fashion. ..WWS.. opens with combat carnage that flows in the MING YANG Pass that I also passed thru 11 years later after our Victory in the IA DRANG Valley in November 1965. ...Unrelenting combat is shown as it was in .."WE WERE SOLDIERS".. while not forgetting about our families back home who were also hard hit as depicted. A great Example for the now...?
...The Lost Platoon's Commanding Officer 2/Lt. HENRY HERRICK was the one who DID unwisely lead his men up that enemy infested Chu Phong Mountain chasing one NVA Enemy Soldier right after arriving at LZ (Landing Zone) X-Ray.
...Lt. HERRICK's men paid the Price for what he did, but some now say that our having an isolated American stand outside the North East Flank of LZ X-Ray may have unwittingly been providential in the long run as we were never overrun there in great measure to the unrelenting incoming Artillery required from my Landing Zone Falcon homing in on two seperate targets, bringing confusion to the Enemy.
...I will NEVER FORGET having to personally type up Lt. Col. HAL G. MOORE's -Letter of Condolance- to Lt. HENRY HERRICK's Parents after the Battle.
...SAM ELLIOTT's S/Maj BASIL L. PLUMLEY Characterization is true to life. This -Lion in Winter- who parachuted behind enemy lines in Nazi-Occupied France the night before the Invasion of Normandy, fought at the last Major Battle of the Korean War at PORK CHOP HILL and then at the 1st Major Battle of the Vietnam War in the IA DRANG VALLEY ...carried a .45 Pistol only. I know, because I personally cleaned it for him.
...MEL GIBSON's Lt. Col. HAL G. MOORE standing in the middle of Landing Zone X-Ray at the worst of times to survey his BAttle situation ...actually happened from behind the tall Ant Hill you see in the Film. Again, its RANDALL WALLACE's way of graphically telling us MOORE's saving Leadership story when the 7th Cavalry needed every offensive aircraft in Vietnam at its disposal in his "BROKEN ARROW" Call.
...GREG KINNEAR's Major BRUCE CRANDALL incident at the rear was actually more fierce than depicted in ..WWS.. as a result of his righteous indignation. Fierce Combat does that, especially when the Hueys from the rear refused to come in to the rescue like he and his Congressional Medal of Honor Wingman ED "TOO TALL" FREEMAN did so unselfishly at LZ X-Ray.
...Actually the terrain of the IA DRANG Valley is VERY similiar to the California terrain shown in ..WWS.. at Fort Hunter-Ligget. Almost a perfect match. Highlands are different then the Lowlands in South Vietnam.
...As for any ignorance you express having about the IA DRANG Battle, and everything surrounding it, may I suggest you get a hold of a copy of the book the movie was based on by now Lt. Gen. HAL G. MOORE (Ret.) and JOE GALLOWAY titled:
'WE WERE SOLDIERS ONCE and YOUNG" ..?
...It's now availble in small paperback with MEL GIBSON on the cover and in larger paperback and hardcover versions with IA DRANG/World Trade Center Lifesaving Hero Lt. RICK RESCORLA on the cover.
Thank you, again, for your keen interest.
GARRY OWEN, Sir
Signed:..ALOHA RONNIE Guyer
MOORE/PLUMLEY's Radioman/Driver/Orderly Assistant right up to the Battle of IA DRANG-1965
http://www.lzxray.com