Rating: 
Summary: I don't know why I waste my time watching John Woo movies.
Review: I don't know why I waste my time watching John Woo movies. This guy is so over rated. I wanted to watch Windtalkers but turned it off after the second war action sequence. The war scenes were not realistic. In particular, the first battle involving Cage and the code breakers was too un-realistic. One view shows a bunch of foxholes (or bomb holes) all neatly dug out all looking identical. I could go on and on about Woo movies but I don't want to waste my time. I'm hoping to save others from wasting their time and money.
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Summary: Windtalker made me an "Earlywalker!"
Review: Lots of bombs going off. Lots of guys getting shot and dying. Three Navajo indians call in an air stike. More bombs going off. More guys getting shot and dying. Marine picks a fist fight with another Marine in a battle zone (yeah, that could happen). More bombs going off. More guys getting shot and dying. I turned it off and tried to dream up a way to get a refund. I think that about sums up this lame movie. I agree with another reviewer: There was a good story here somewhere, I just never came out of hiding before I gave up on it.
Rating:
Summary: Disappointing
Review: Typical John Woo film. Minimum story; maximum blood.
As in Face Off, Woo sets up personal conflicts, moral abiguities, conflicts of duty, friendship, loyalty and emotion. Then develops none of them. This could have been a masterpiece on par with Private Ryan or Thin Red Line, but ended up being a WWII version of 3000 Miles to Graceland. Yes war is about senseless violence and death, but this movie was billed as being a story about the Navaho Code Talkers. I was hoping for a film that was actually about the Navaho Code-talkers. Unfortunately this was not it. Yes it did feature a code-talker or two here and there but it was more about explosions, blood and flying bodies. Not as some reviewers claim war violence but the worst of Hollywood's stylized over choreographed nonsense. Woo kept forgetting that the mnovie was supposedly about the Code talkers, then would suddenly remember and throw in a few seconds of a Navaho yelling into a radio, then back to the gore and explosions. The explosions were not even realistic. I am sorry, but hand grenades do not produce 10 foot fireballs, Thompsons do not fire at 1800 rounds per minutes and .30 carbines do not throw their victims back through the air when the round hits. As in "Face Off", John Woo took an intriguing psychological concept, dropped the concept in midstream filled the rest in with unrealistic and excessive violence. I found this movie very tiresome and had I seen it in the theatre I would have most likely have walked out midway through the picture. With the DVD it took me 4 sittings to finally bull my way through it. If you want a proper war movie get or see "We Were Soldiers" Don't waste your money on this mess of a nonsensical movie.
Rating: 
Summary: Disapointing
Review: I Thought I was going to watch a movie with some historical accuracy with some dramatic flare added for content. Instead I watched an over acted over dramatized movie with little or no entertainment value. Nicolas Cage Was the star in this film and had one of the worst performances I've ever seen. If it had been billed a an action movie maybe it would have been better but since we were told it had some historical accuracy I was quite disappointed with the rambo style acting he added to this movie. I will admit that the script he was working with did not give him much room for improvment.
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Summary: Terrible Movie- Injustice to Native Americans
Review: It's a shame that a movie so awful should depict the courageous effort of the Navajo during WWII. Storyline, acting and directing are of the worst caliber I have yet seen in a movie. Don't waste your time.
Rating:
Summary: windtalkers
Review: if there were an award for the worst pictures of 2002, i would nominate this. this movie managed to take a potentially good story and make a mishmash of utter nonsense out of it. nicholas cage's emotions run the full gamut from very angry to very, very angry with absolutely nothing in between or at either end. if one is fond of gruatuitous violence this is the movie for you. i quit watching at the completely improbable scene of the navajo, whom cage was to be shepherding, dressing in a japanese uniform and "pretending" he had captured cage. this only served to allow more staged violence. and, by the way, i noted the deciduous trees on "saipan" exhibiting their fall colors??? where was this thing filmed? numerous grade b saturday morning cowboy movies were more believable.
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Summary: This is no Face-Off! John Woo is human afterall.
Review: This story contains cliche after cliche and NEVER suceeds in transporting you back in time, let alone, back into war. Nicholas Cage and John Woo were superb in "Face Off." What was different - the SCRIPT! John Woo spent plenty of money on pyrotechnics and wardrobe in Windtalkers. However, this film proves that loud explosions and accurate uniforms alone - do not produce the illusion of war. I fault John Woo for serving-up a softball of "politically correct" bubble gum. The two main Indian characters are at the same time perfect Americans and perfect Indians. All writers know that perfect characters are boring. Characters need emotional baggage and flaws in order for them to grow. In Windtalkers the two uber-perfect Indians were used as a backdrop to contrast a battle-worn incensitive white guy (Nicholas Cage) and a horribly racist white guy (Noah Emmerich). Cage's character is sharp enough to begin to respect the uber perfect Indians. However, the uber-racist character (Emmerich) is completely blind to the Indians' unflinching patriotism and (not to mention) the competitive advantage they represent due to their unbroken code. The uber racist first slanders the Indians by using profanity comparing them to Japanese soldiers and then resorts to fighting. I was, and I am positive ALL Indians were - VERY dissapointed in this movie. Why? Because we mistakenly thought this movie was focussed on real Indians. This movie is firmly focussed on white guys and how wierd they act in the presence of perfect Indians. What began as a politically correct "ode to the American Indian" - went (as it always does) horribly wrong. Please let this disaster of a movie act as a reminder to all those who worship at the alter of political correctness. Think hard before making a 'tribute' to someone or some group. By making your tribute unrealistically flattering - you run the risk (as shown here) of creating tribute unto itself and mistankenly offend your audience. I suggest that people watch Riddley Scott's Gladiator and Black Hawk Down if they want to see war movies that actually transport you back in time.
Rating: 
Summary: Enjoyable Throwback; But Not a Classic
Review: Director John Woo knows how to best utilize actor Nicolas Cage, having worked with him in FACE/OFF; you give him very little dialogue. Cage does a great job playing a taciturn shell of a man, and he is very comfortable with the action scenes. Woo's epic-scale battle scenes are very well staged, full of roving dolly and crane shots swinging across a vast panorama of blood, steaming steel on mortar, tank, and artillary; flashing swords, bayonets and hunting knives, and the rolling red-orange fire clouds of huge explosions. Most of the action takes place on the home island of Saipan, with the Japanese troops dug in; tenacious frenzied fanatics. But the Japanese are shown as poor shots, easily duped, and easily defeated in hand-to-hand combat. They are slaughtered wholesale like cardboard cut-outs in a shooting range; kind of like the Indians in all those John Ford westerns; nearly faceless and soulless. The writing by John Rice and Joe Batteer is two-dimensional at best. The primary weakness of the script is that after finding the fabulous hook, the little known story of the Navajo code-talkers, they do not fully explore it. Some critics were unhappy with the Monument Valley prologue and epilogue, but actually they perfectly frame the training and battle scenes. Oddly, these early and late scenes seem to breathe in the world of 1944. They have nice texture, and a feel for the '40's. The rest of the film seems too contemporary. We know that our boys are fighting the Japanese, but it easily could have been the N.Koreans, or the N.Vietnamese. A good troupe of actors struggled with the shallow script. Nicolas Cage is very effective as the shell-shocked neurotic tortured Joe Enders. He spends a lot of time clicking his zippo lighter, smoking, and staring sad-eyed out into space; and it works for his character. Adam Beach, a veteran of several films about Native Americans, is excellent as Ben Yahzee. Yes, he smiles a lot, but never as a dolt; always from the heart, never insincere. He was a good man, who would transcend into a better man through the bloody cauldron of battle, through watching his friends die, through the killing of others. Roger Willie, as his buddy Charlie Whitehorse, who is a real Navajo, debuted in this film, and he made a solid impact. Again, this film missed out on "classic" status, because not enough time was given to these Indian characters. Cage's character becomes the Sgt. Rock of the piece, and instead Enders needed to be more peripheral, more secondary. Artistically, this did not need to be a Nicolas Cage picture. Of course, financially, I'm sure it was a different story. The movie would have soared if the Navajos had had more of the focus. Francis O'Conner, as the sympathetic nurse love-interest for Cage was gratuitous and wasted; a good actress tossed aside by poor plotting. Christian Slater as Pete "Ox" Anderson, found some effective screen time; breathing life into his cliche role; creating good moments out of nothing. His harmonica duets with Whitehorse's Indian flute could have been a much stronger motif, but it was handled poorly, and it got lost in the din, drown out by the staccato of machine guns. Peter Stormare, wild-eyed and thick-accented, found the pulse of his character, squad leader Sgt. Gunny Hjelmstad. One of the major plot twists involved orders to kill the Navajos rather than let them be captured, and possibly compromise the code. This could have been the stuff of drama, but it never really jelled. And why were these two valuable Windtalkers put in harm's way in the first place ? The film could have been much more powerful if we had known more about, and cared more about the Indian characters. Even the cliches regarding racism would have been better served if we had seen more of the story from the Navajo perspective. Perhaps some day, the Navajo's story will be more accurately depicted. It surely is a story worth telling. That story was only hinted at, and glossed over within this film. But despite the rough edges, this movie packed a solid punch, and it stirred the blood to sit through it. It is an above average WWII war movie, and it is well worth the viewing.
Rating: 
Summary: Take this movie for what it is and you won't be disappointed
Review: I loved this movie for what it was. Some of the reviews I read seemed to expect too much from this movie. Sure it was a war movie. Sure it wasn't totally historically accurate. Sure it had some cliches. But let's be honest; not every war movie is historically accurate. A lot of war movies focus more on drama and the soldiers' lives. This one didn't. This was an action epic, and I liked that. While movies like Saving Private Ryan and Braveheart focused on acting, this one focused on action. Both are good. John Woo did a good job, and Nicolas Cage's acting was fine. In fact it was really good, since it convinced some reviewers that Nicolas Cage was actually that dull of a person. But he had to act that way to portray the character, which made the movie even better. So, all in all this movie wasn't the best war movie ever made, but it served it's purpose as an entertaining action movie for fans of the genre.
Rating:
Summary: "Windtalkers"
Review: Windtalker's, in my opinion, is one of the best World War II Movies to come out in several years. I'm not normally a big Nicholas Cage fan; however, he does an absolutely wonderful job in this movie. This film also does a wonderful job of showing exactly what the US Marine Corps is supposed to be used for and how a beach landing is performed. The premise: In the beginning of the movie we see Nicholas Cage's character in charge of his squad, their surrounded and being over run by the Japanese. From that amazing scene we're taken to Hawaii where he's recovering, and then gets the assignment to guard the "Windtalker." From there, we're taken back to the war in the Pacific. What follows is an excellent and sometimes gut wrenching story about a Marine who has an extremely tough job to do and the internal conflict he has about that mission. As I said before, this is certainly one of the best World War II movies to come out in some time and it's certainly the best one about the war in the Pacific in a great many years. The SPOILER paragraphs. I've noticed that some of the other reviewers stated that they didn't understand what this movie was about. They also said that it was nothing but blood, guts and just a lot of killing. With all due respect to those reviewers, I'm not exactly sure what you expected when you sat down to watch this movie then, because blood, guts, gore and senseless killing is what war is all about, quite unfortunately. For those that didn't understand what this movie was about; maybe you have to be in or have been in the military to understand this one, I'm not sure. First and foremost, the movie is about the suffering that Nicholas Cage's character goes through after his entire squad is killed and he's seriously injured. As the squad leader who ended up in charge, he feels responsible for the death of his men and that he is the only one that survived. He obviously has the whole gamut of emotions to go with it, to include a healthy portion of rage. He take's that rage with him to Saipan and unleashes it on the Japanese there and in the same sense, becomes a heroic Marine, doing things that most people get killed quickly for. While suffering the emotional spectrum of his earlier combat experience, he's given the mission to protect the code. The ideological thing to pay attention to here is, that it's the code he's assigned to protect, not specifically the bearer of that code. That in and of itself is the inner turmoil that makes this movie and the character the winner that it is. As a human, he has the ethical upbringing that is telling him that he shouldn't kill a fellow American, no matter what. As a Marine though, he has the training that, by military law is supposed to supercede his ethical upbringing. When he does actually have to kill one of them, pay attention to the fact that he doesn't care if he dies now. This is an extremely emotional and gut wrenching movie that very clearly tells its story. Nicholas Cage should at the very least, earn an Oscar nomination if not the award for his work on this film.
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