Lone Survivor (2013)

I realized before watching Lone Survivor is that the title itself is a spoiler.  Even without being familiar with the real events this was based on or reading Marcus Luttrell's book about his experience, all you have to do is look at the title to know how it's going to turn out.  It kind of a downer when the title saps some of the suspense of a film.  Imagine if The Sixth Sense had been alternatively titled He's a Ghost?

Lone Survivor is the true story of Operation Red Wings in Afghanistan.  Marcus Luttrell (Mark Wahlberg) is part of a four-man Navy Seal team, the remainder played by Ben Foster, Taylor Kitsch and Emile Hirsch, on a mission to capture a Taliban leader.  While staking out the small village where he's hiding, a trio of goat herders, including two boys, happens upon them.  They have to make a difficult choice: let them go and hope they can get to safety before the Taliban finds them, or kill them and complete their mission.  They decide to uphold the rules of engagement and take their chances.  For the record, I voted for killing them, but I'm a murderous, cyborg psychopath.

Of course the Taliban catches up to them, and from there it becomes fight for survival.  A punishing, white-knuckle fight for survival.

Lone Survivor is just brutal at times.  This is not a glamorous film about war.  The amount of bodily abuse these guys take is superhuman.  It helps that the film begins with a montage of SEAL training.  When you see how grueling it is, it's easier to understand how these soldiers can keep going while taking so much punishment.  It's what they were trained for.

Their fight is unrelenting, and it's a little heartbreaking knowing in advance how it's going to turn out. This kind of leads into my only real issue with Lone Survivor.  We don't get to know the individuals very well. Writer/director Peter Berg decided to focus more on the action and overall heroism than any type of character moments. There are a few small details here and there, but we know almost nothing about them otherwise.  In fact, I struggled to recall anyone's name by the end.  We care because they are our soldiers and we want to see them survive, but not because of any emotional investment we have with them.  As the film is a tribute to these soldiers, I would have liked to know more about them personally.

Despite not getting to know the team, there is a clear sense of brotherhood and how much they care about each other.  Team is made up of a very strong cast that makes it a little easier to connect with them.  While Wahlberg is the star, I don't want to single anyone out as it kind of takes away from the sacrifice they collectively made.  It didn't take too long before I stopped seeing them as Marky Mark, Warren Worthington, the kid from The Girl Next Door and Tim Riggins, and just saw them as soldiers.  And of course no military-themed Peter Berg film would be complete without a Turtle (Jerry Ferrara) sighting.

The overall intensity of the action makes it easy to overlook these flaws.  Once the firefight begins, you'll be on the edge of your seat until the conclusion.  With the way the action was shot, there are many moments where you feel immersed in it.  I'm kicking myself for not seeing this in RPX as the sound was fantastic.  There are rattling explosions that made me jump in my seat a few times.  Nothing beats the throaty, metallic sound of the sniper rifle either.  Correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe it was an MK 12 (had to look it up).  A better sound system in the theatre would have really made this sing.

Sure, you might come out of it a little, "Rah, rah, USA," but what's wrong with that?  I'm sure that's a little bit of what Peter Berg was going for, but it's not over the top.  I didn't watch Lone Survivor and feel like it was a recruitment film or shoving politics in your face.  It's pretty neutral as far as that goes, and is more about the mission and the the sacrifice of the soldiers.

While Lone Survivor is a brutal war movie, it's also a powerful tribute to the courage and resilience of these soldiers.  If this wasn't based on a true story, it would be easier to watch this as simply a very good action film, but knowing the sacrifice behind it adds a solemn feeling.  Definitely worth a watch though and one of the more realistic films about war I've seen in a while.

4 (out of 5) Death Stars

Savages (2012) - Movie Review

Did you know what "savages" meant?  Well, neither did I!  Fortunately, the latest Oliver Stone movie, Savages, defines it for you, so you get some learnin' with your early images of decapitated bodies.

Savages follows the threesome of Ben, Chon, and O, which is short for Ophelia, and not Oprah as you'd expect.  Also, before I get into it, "Chon"?  Throughout the movie I kept wondering if they were just saying "John" weird.  A few times I honestly thought they were saying "Tron".  Who the hell names their kid "Chon" anyway?   Please don't tell me this is going to become one of those trendy, middle-class names.  It was very distracting every time I heard it.

Anyway, Ben (Aaron Johnson) is the Buddhist, hippie-type, yet has degrees in business and botany, that creates the drugs; Chon (Taylor Kitsch), a former Navy Seal, is basically just there to be the muscle; and O (Blake Lively), is both of their girlfriends.  She also doubles as the corny narration throughout the film.  After she establishes that she's sleeping with both of them, she makes a comment about how we probably think she's a slut.  This was met with a collective, agreeing laugh from the audience.

Ben and Chon have been best buds since high school, but I have a hard time believing any friendship strong enough to share a woman.  It's just too implausible to get behind in the first place.  Taking a page from Breaking Bad, Ben's skill in botany has allowed them to create the best marijuana on the planet.  This has made them rich and in great demand.  They take a meeting with a Mexican drug cartel ran by Salma Hayek, and her right-hand man, played by Benicio Del Toro.  They make a simple offer: teach us how to make marijuana and we'll make you even richer.  It's clear that saying no to these guys would be bad.  What do these geniuses do?  They not only say no, but insult the Mexican drug cartel in the process.   There's no surprise as to where this is headed now.

The frustrating thing about a movie like Savages is that it has all the right things going for it, but it becomes clear that the movie is going along a fairly predictable path, and the actions of the characters are just head scratching at times.  Then, you have terrible pacing issues where it takes almost an hour before anything substantial happens.  You spend almost half of this 130-minute movie following three characters that you don't care about or find anything to identify with.  These guys have the life: they live in a huge house on the beach, have tons of money, have sex all the time and seem to have very little risk as they work with medical distribution places.  I don't find that very interesting, and the story drags whenever it focuses on them.  Their only conflict is the one they created themselves by refusing the cartel's offer.  The 'bad guys' in Savages were more interesting and entertaining, and I found myself rooting for them more than the supposed protagonists.

Savages was based on a book of the same name by Don Winslow, who co-wrote the screenplay with Stone and Shane Salerno.  I've heard good things about the book, but I feel like something got lost in the adaptation.  It also doesn't help there's some really awful dialog throughout the film.  The narration by O's character is so bad that it made me wince at times.  The story felt convoluted, and it's one of the worst endings I've seen in a while.  Talk about a cop out.  I won't spoil it, but if you've seen Funny Games, then know that it's pretty similar.

It's not all bad though.  Savages is very brutal and dark, two things I normally enjoy about drug related films.  However, some of the violence felt thrown in for shock value, as if they didn't know what to do, so they would just linger on a violent scene.  A guess a movie called Savages should have lots of savage violence in it to maintain title integrity.  It's a good looking film as well, but again, it feels like there's more style here than substance.

The performances work for the most part.  I really enjoyed Selma Hayek, Benicio Del Toro and John Travolta.  Hayek was really over-the-top, but I thought it worked well for the character.  Travolta is great as the sneaky DEA agent playing both sides.  The standout is Benicio Del Toro though.  He feels like a caged, rabid animal, and you never quite know what he's going to do next.  Most of the highlights of the film involve either him, Hayek or Travolta.  I also enjoyed Emile Hirsch as Ben and Chon's techie/money laundering guy.  I like him in smaller roles like this.

Aaron Johnson, who you might remember from Kick-Ass, was the most interesting out of the threesome, but that's mainly because you actually got to see his character evolve as the movie went on.  While I didn't have a problem with Taylor Kitsch or Blake Lively, I felt their characters were totally flat and really not given any depth to them.

Oh, and here's a huge pet peeve of mine: I can't stand it when there are sex scenes in a movie where everyone keeps their clothes on.  It doesn't seem realistic to me at all.  At one point they are in a bathtub having sex with clothes on.  Who does that?

Savages is violent, dark and has some great performances.  Unfortunately, those great performances come from the characters you aren't supposed to root for.  It takes way too long to get started and is betrayed by a terrible ending.  I just wasn't into it.  It's interesting that the poster for Savages already looks like a Blu-Ray cover, because that's how I suggest most of you watch this.  It's a rental.

2.5 (out of 5) Death Stars