Sterile homefront undercuts 'Soldiers'

We Were Soldiers - R\nStarring: Mel Gibson, Sam Elliot, Barry Pepper\nDirected by: Randall Wallace\nShowing: Showplace West 12\nHave you ever tried to get a point across, only to wind up sending the complete opposite message? Don't worry, you're not alone; the writers of "We Were Soldiers" are in the same boat.\nSet in Vietnam in 1965, the film revolves around the true story of an Air Cavalry unit that was the first American force to engage Vietcong soldiers. Mel Gibson plays Lt. Col. Moore, the commander of the Air Cavalry regiment, a dedicated soldier with a wife and five kids back home.\n"We Were Soldiers" is a war movie through and through but unfortunately the writer, Randall Wallace, who was responsible for both Gibson's amazing "Braveheart" and the agonizingly bad "Pearl Harbor, decided to spend time showing the home front. There's nothing inherently wrong with showing the effects of the war on the those at home in the States, except for the fact that it comes off as completely bogus in this film. The wives are the smiling, happy types seen in '50s sitcoms. There's no hint whatsoever of any kind of backlash against the war, and everything feels positively sterile. \nI'm sorry, but I have a hard time reconciling this image of the 1960s and the Vietnam war with everything else I've read and seen; from Gibson's nauseatingly cute kids to the heavy-handed religious overtones that mark the first third of the film, I felt as if the Vietnam war had somehow magically taken place a decade earlier. A notable exception to the "Pleasantville"-like atmosphere is a scene where war-department telegrams begin filtering across the base, their buff-colored envelopes bearing death notices.\nBut the combat scenes in "We Were Soldiers" are simultaneously gut-wrenching and awe-inspiring. In an age of impressively shot war epics, "We Were Soldiers" certainly makes quite an impression, particularly a scene involving a pair of misguided Napalm bombs. The scenes are fittingly horrifying, and once again bring home the point that war is not a pretty thing.\nInterestingly, "We Were Soldiers" makes an effort to show the battle from both sides. While little time is spent portraying the Vietcong soldiers compared to their American counterparts, the efforts that are made go a long way in humanizing the Vietcong, as opposed to them just being cannon fodder for U.S. machine guns.\nFor a movie that's making an effort to honor the American dead and their heroism, the film ends up sending a distinctly anti-war message, which is a nice counterpoint to the rabid war mongering Americans seem to have recently developed. "We Were Soldiers" is a solid, if somewhat mixed film.\n

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