We Were Soldiers (UK)

This much-maligned war film was a surprise to me. This isn't nearly as bad as most critics say. To be honest I get tried of critics reviewing war films. Why? Simple, according to them every single war film is bad because they are all patriotic. Hell, they even criticize "Saving Private Ryan", and the only reason they give- there's only American soldiers. Of course, "We Were Soldiers" got that too, but in bucket loads.

"We Were Soldiers" isn't a great film or will it be remembered in the annuals of war films. But it is an interesting 2-hour diversion. What I particularly like about "We Were Soldiers" is the unpredictability of the war scenes. Bullets will fly onto screen from nowhere and kill someone without time for you to register it. While "We Were Soldiers" lacks the grueling intensity of "Saving Private Ryan", it is still a very violent film.

Video: A very steady transfer. Devoid of defects and full of the lush greens of the Vietnam land, this is a very fine transfer. There are some compression signs and chapter 3 has an overbearing amount of noise. But overall a very nice transfer. Blood is Peckinpah blood, ie light. The effects are generally good, despite one devious scene of napalm setting fire to someone's face. Dean Semlar's cinematography is very good and makes the war scenes come alive.

Audio: This is an excellent soundtrack. Once the gunfire starts, you are engulfed into a strong an incredibly multi-layered soundtrack. You really are put smack bang in the middle of the action. Surrounds are aggressive and are use constantly. Bass is also very strong during explosions. It's not just the fighting were this track excels. You can hear birds chirping in the woods. And listen to Mel's speech on the loudspeaker before they leave, excellent stuff.

Extras: Up first is a Randall Wallace commentary. He has very interesting comments on both the film and the real life events. Listening to this commentary will give you a good insight into the history of the event. Like the film, it's quite boring during the first 30 minutes. But once the war starts the commentary become interesting. Sadly, he doesn't apologies for his Pearl Harbor script. He also offers commentary for the "Deleted Scenes", which are presented in good quality.

"Getting It Right" is a nice 20-minute documentary about the extents the makers went to making the film realistic. It also includes a look at the film's sound effect. TV spots and trailers round off the disc.

Overall: Although occasionally over-melodramatic (the wife's story, the "tell my wife I love her" last lines), "We Were Soldiers" is a fine film and Gibson is on fine form. Great presentation and nice, if lacking extras, make for a good buy.

There have been all to many war movies in recent times. Sadly in my opinion, what needed to be said about war has already been said and It just isnt worth making more movies about them. Fair enough each movie has different settings or whatever but the end theme is the same: War is harrowing and bad. True war heroes deserve to be acknowledged but there are other ways other than making a movie and trying to milk money by portraying many deaths.
After watching this movie, I just felt tired of war movies and I will probably never watch another one again. This is however not the fault of the movie and if you havent seen many war movies, you might like this. The movie is about the vietnam war and focuses on one battle in the valley of death where american soldiers were outnumbered by vietnamese soldiers but overcame them with their patriotism, courage, loyalty and bravery. The movie also shows a different side, the side of the wives of the soldiers who went to war. This was quite interesting but they never went too much into it.
The visuals are pretty good but that is what you expect from a newly released movie. The battle scenes were well shot in great detail. The sound is terrific especially during the battle scenes.
There are some decent extras including a trailer, commentary and a documentary about how they had to make the movie correct and true.
Overall this is not worth purchasing and only worth renting if war is your genre.