Summary:
Ten years after his son went MIA in Vietnam, a retired Colonel assembles a private rescue team to storm a POW camp in Laos, where he believes his son is being kept.
My Thoughts:
In March, I took a vacation with my family to Hawaii, and whilst we were there, we stumbled upon some rice paddies that had been used in the filming of “Uncommon Valor”, a film that, up until then, I had never heard about. Always the cinephile, I immediately jumped on IMDb and did a bit of research. At first glance, the film didn’t look great. It had received mostly negative reviews, but I was familiar with the director Ted Kotcheff (“First Blood”, “Wake in Fright”) so I figured it couldn’t be all bad. I vowed that when I returned to the contiguous United States I would watch Uncommon Valor (note the picture to the left- that’s me standing on a hill overlooking where the first scene of this movie was shot. My apathetic expression is a result of knowing I’ll end up watching this middling movie).
Well, now I’ve watched it, and I can confirm it’s pretty bad. It’s not terrible. There are a few scenes that I could point to and say, “This is the reason Gene Hackman chose to do this script,” but there are enough moments that I wondered if something had gone wrong during production. There were so many small technical and art department issues that it looked as if this production was doomed from the get-go. Kotcheff was coming hot off the success of “First Blood”, and I’m guessing studios gave him a bigger budget and maybe he just didn’t know how to use it.
“Most human problems can be solved by an appropriate charge of high explosives.”
Ten years after his son went MIA in Vietnam, Col. Jason Rhodes (Gene Hackman, “Unforgiven”) has had enough with politicians trying to negotiate the return of POWs, and he decides to take matters into his own hands. With the financial backing of a rich businessman whose son is also MIA, Rhodes assembles a team of elite soldiers, including Kevin Scott (Patrick Swayze, “Road House”) , to go behind enemy lines and rescue those who have been held captive for so long.
Okay, I know I already mentioned this above, but I want to mention again that there are actually some decent parts in this movie. Gene Hackman gives this movie his all, and there are a few scenes where it felt like we were watching a truly decent film, primarily thanks to the charisma Hackman brings to the screen. Hackman is a great enough actor that he can sell the cheesy lines and cliché plot points, and even make us care about some of the characters. The main story for the film, while it might feel a little like patriotic propaganda, is pretty fun. Honestly, the plot for this movie is pretty much the plot for “First Blood II: Rambo”, with only a few minor tweaks; it could’ve been a great action movie… but there were just so many problems.
The most glaring problem is that none of the other actors can hold a candle to Hackman. Some of the actors seem to be visibly nervous to work with him. Other actors give some of the most awkward delivery I’ve ever heard, while more actors are entirely devoid of emotion. Patrick Swayze, on the other hand, gives it his all, and ends up hamming the entire film.
Beyond acting, we get into the script, which is so cut and dry it feels like it came fresh out of an 80s Action Movie Factory. While the basic premise is somewhat interesting, the way the film goes about developing plot points is incredibly boring. I watched this film with my roommate Jared, and both of us are well versed in bad 80s action movies (we frequently pop in Kung Fu movies when we’ve nothing else to do). As we watched this movie, we began breaking down the plot, and it was quite easy to do. We predicted what kinds of characters would be in this movie (the rough and tough but grounded guys, the bada**, the wild card, and the rookie). We predicted that there would be a training montage, and there was (an extraordinarily long one that really slowed the pacing). And then, when the rescue mission actually happened, we guessed which guys would end up dying, and we were mostly right. Nothing that happened in this movie surprised me at all. It is the most generic 80s action flick you can imagine. That doesn’t inherently make a movie bad. If this were just a run-of-the-mill action movie that was competently put together, I would have had no problem giving this film a 3/5. But, there are further problems.
One of the things that stuck out to me first was the bland cinematography and disjointed editing. There are so many scenes that are shot full bodied, with the camera just pointed vaguely in the direction of the action. Those kinds of shots don’t say anything about the characters or their motivations, nor does it make the film any more interesting. The editing was so jumbled that sometimes the viewer had to piece together what happened in order for the scene to make any sense.
For example, in one scene, a few soldiers radio Gene Hackman, and the two sides have a conversation. In a normal movie, the conversation would be edited so that we jump back and forth between the two parties, listening to the conversation as it plays out. In this film, we see the entirety of the conversation from the soldier’s side of the radio- then the entirety from Gene Hackman’s side.
The resulting scene plays out like somewhat like this:
EXT. DAY- OUTSIDE FENCE OF POW CAMP
Soldier One sneaks closer to fence, pulls out radio.
Soldier One: “Hey Gene Hackman, where are we supposed to go, over?”
(Soldier One stares off awkwardly into the distance)
Solider One: “Perfect, well head that way. Just to let you know, we see some bad guys approaching your way. Over.”
(Soldier One again stares awkwardly off into the distance)
Soldier One: “We’ll see you there. Over and out.”
EXT. DAY- HILLS OUTSIDE POW CAMP
Hackman listens intently to radio.
Hackman: “Go over to the left, see if you can sneak behind the fence.”
(Hackman stares awkwardly)
Hackman: “Roger, thanks for the heads up. We’ll meet you down there in 30 minutes.”
(Hackman stares awkwardly)
End Scene.
There are probably three or four sequences that play out like this, where the viewer is forced to do a little editing in their minds to make sense of the story. The resulting scene feels incredibly unnatural and it also forces the viewer to sit through the same conversation twice.
There were also quite a few issues with art department. Perhaps the most notable issue was when Gene Hackman and company wander through a village that has been hit with mustard gas. When Hackman and his coterie file through this village, there are dozens of bleached white bones scattered across the ground. Now, I don’t know about you, but I’ve seen some pictures of people hit by mustard gas, and that stuff is not pretty- it burns your skin, gives you huge blisters; if inhaled it inflames your lungs and can kill you… it does not vaporize flesh and leave bleached bones behind. Whoever was in the art department had no idea what mustard gas does to people. There were several other scenes where things were glaringly wrong or out of place (like why is Gene Hackman wearing an ascot in the jungle?). For instance, there’s one scene were the soldiers are training in full gear, and then in the next shot, all of the soldiers are wearing all of their gear except their army boots; instead of boots they wear tennis shoes (note the picture of Swayze laying in water). I suspect that the costume department probably forgot their boots that day, and the director just decided to shoot anyways.
Verdict:
This is a very middle of the road action movie. I anticipated this film to be rather middling and it was, but that wasn’t really the reason I watched it. Honestly, it was cool just to see a place where I had been utilized onscreen. There were a few moments that seemed glimmers of hope in an otherwise dismal and dreary world, but would I recommend it? Heavens no. This film has largely been forgotten, as well it should. There are plenty of better Vietnam movies out there, and plenty of them that follow a similar storyline. Unless you’ve an undying love for Swayze or Hackman, you can skip this one.
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