Movie Review: Red Dawn (2012)

This post does not contain any spoilers, so even if you haven't seen the film, feel free to read on!


I feel that it's necessary to preface this review with the fact that I am huge fan of the 1984 Red Dawn film. If you haven't yet seen the film, I would strongly suggest renting and watching it before paying full ticket price to see it in the theater. The 2012 remake uses essentially the plot line with a few modenizations.

Now to the 2012 version.

First note, if you go into this movie expecting anything else but an absurd action romp with ridiculous situations, and a bunch a kids battling a highly trained military force, you should simply turn around and walk out. This movie is full of urban fight scenes, guerrilla warfare, and lots and lots of explosions. The urban warfare was one element that stood out significantly against the original. There, majority of the battles were set in the countryside or a sparsely populated town. In 2012, a large portion of their battles are in and around buildings, and were surprisingly well choreographed. You have to give the film a few points here. Despite the absurd situations surrounding the urban battles, they actually were very well done.

The acting across the board wasn't terribly poor, with a single major exception. After seeing Chris Hemsworth in films such as Thor and Cabin in the Woods (which I strongly recommend if you are a fan of the genre), I've come to expect a certain style/quality of acting from him and delivered exactly what you would expect. A few tense patriotic speeches, aggressive assaults on the enemy, group leader chemistry. It all worked well for him. I wasn't all that impressed with Josh Hutcherson, but then I also was not a huge fan of him in the first Hunger Games movie. I was pleasantly surprised with Connor Cruise's performance. I missed his debut in Seven Pounds, but the kid was a decent actor and could have a good future in front of him.

Despite these solid performances, Josh Peck was a total letdown. He often played against Chris Hemsworth and the difference in talent or execution (I haven't seen him in anything else and therefore cannot say he is a poor actor overall), was very apparent. The chemistry simply wasn't there with the rest of the cast, and his face was too often overtaken by this mopey, pissed off teenager look (seen to the left). His voice also often switched into this deep gravely bit with a strangle cadence to his words. Not really sure what was going on here, but everyone I went to see the film with had the same poor impressions of his performance.

Overall, this film delivered exactly what I expected out of it and little else. Did I regret my $15 spent to see the film? No, but would I make the same choice again? Ehh, can't say for sure, but I would have seen it eventually on Netflix simply because I was a fan of the original.

Final Score: 6/10

Book Review: Chickenhawk by Robert Mason

I've dabbled in war literature in the past and have learned that I can only really dive into one of these books when it is told as a first person narrative story. Too often, however, many of these books spend way time diving into exact dates, locations, historical context, and the like. If I'm picking up a this type of book about the Vietnam war, I'm reading it because I've been exposed to the content before, have a reasonable idea of the general historical context and am most certainly not looking for a history lesson of names and dates. I'm looking to get an exposure into what this war was like for the real people who lived in on the ground everyday.

That being said, if you are picking up this book for a history lesson, I would put it right back down. Mason readily admits in his afterword the book has quite a few historical inaccuracies, mix ups of names and dates, and incorrect locations.

But then again, who cares?

The point of this book is to provide a detailed snapshot into the life of helicopter pilots in Vietnam, something this book does better than any other I have read so far.

Over and over again throughout the book, Mason paints incredibly detailed pictures of life in Vietnam for an American soldier. We are exposed to the terrible conditions these soldiers lived in, from outdoor latrines, to miserably hot and humid weather, to the constant worry of mortar attacks. We live in the cockpit with him as he runs troops all over Vietnam, dropping them into deserted areas and LZs so hot that others were amazed the pilots agreed to land at all.

What stood out most to me was his exploration of his own psyche during the war. Mason repeatedly questioned his own being in Vietnam and what the end goal was for being there. He talked about feeling guilty for feeling even just a shred of understanding for his enemy, while simultaneously craving some kind of action versus the boredom of days without missions.

All in all, I founds this book to be fascinating and left me with one lasting thought, which I will end this review with:

As fascinated as I am with comtemplating how I personally would react and deal with warfare, I thank the flying spaghetti monster or Zeus or whatever is up there that I have never had the experiences the millions of men and women who serve and have served in our armed forces have seen all over the world. And with that, I say thank you.

Final Score: 9.5/10

Amazon link to the book: http://www.amazon.com/Chickenhawk-Robert-Mason/dp/0143035711