Rating: 
Summary: Great Movie
Review: Once again, great movie. I do like it, as most other Willis movies, very much. If you like this kind of thing, this is one of his best. Very good movie.
Rating:
Summary: This movie is COOL
Review: This movie is cool because it has a good storyline. There is plenty of violence to keep action fans happy, and an engaging plot that keeps you on the edge of your seat. John McCain (Bruce Willis) and his crew of Navy SEALS is faced with a difficult task--remove one woman from a humanitarian operation, and leave behind the sufferers she's trying to alleviate. McCain is faced with a tough decision, one that haunts him throughout the movie.This movie has a moral--don't mess with the USA.
Rating:
Summary: pretty powerful
Review: this is a super intense movie.. true it doesnt really offer anything new, but pretty much everything besides the script is awesome. everything is shot in deep saturated greenish tones, all very lush and wet and high contrast. i couldve just watched the movie with the sound off and enjoyed it, its so beautifully shot, everyone's faces are shiny with rain/sweat and smeared with grime which kind of accentuates their features and just makes the whole deal fun to look at. lots of good faces in the film too, monica bellucci is of course super good-looking, bruce willis' features are all dark and creased so he looks like the sort of character that comic book artists love to draw. the Other Guys in The Squad are the same way, for some reason they are just easy to look at and remember, so that by the end you've connected with them not through dialogue and plot elements but just by the way they behave and look at each other. as for the script, its definitely half-and-half. sometimes the harshly clipped and minimal lines work to emphasize the military mannerisms of the SEALs, but then sometimes things just get corny. theres a lot of sort of stupid lines, and a bit too much cheap plays for emotion, shots of refugee mothers hugging their kids, or just shots of kids by themselves.. theres some short "doing the right thing" sort of speeches that are pretty sappy, not cuz of what theyre saying but just how they say it. like when the black dude goes "these are my people too" etc, its delivered in a sort of soap opera-esque way that just sort of halts the vibe. same with some of the "thank you" stuff at the end, its just kind of cliche and fake. plot-wise theres really nothing new, its like the same plot of saving private ryan and all those other war movies about a unit of guys pulling someone out of a war zone and embarking on a great personal journey in the process etc etc.. of course all the running around comes to a head and theres the "we are about to be killed, who's with me" speech by the leader, shortly followed by The Climactic Battle scene, in which you learn what youve been wondering since the beginning: which members of The Team will be gunned down as they make a desparate last stand and which ones will go limping into the helicopters at the end? however there are a lot of scenes along the way that, while not really being something new and amazing to the genre, carry a lot of depth just because of the way they're handled, which is what makes this movie rise above its spotty script and standard-issue plot. it could easily be a huge cheese fest, with stuff like a hardened commander seeing a burning mission and telling the copter pilot to turn around and go back, or monica bellucci not wanting to leave her peopl. it teeters now and then but overall it maintains the intensity and tension of the story so that by the end, when people are getting shot down and trying to save refugees from angry rebels, theres actually a gravity to the situation beyond just the movie telling you who's good and who's bad. this is an example of a very good and effective war movie. i wouldnt call it action, cuz theres no real action until the end. its really along the lines of saving private ryan (lots of people compare to black hawk down too, but ive never seen that), in that it deals not so much with "good old american soldiers kicking butt" but more with personal and moral issues that come about in such a bizarre place as a combat zone. this is i think what separates a good war movie from an action flick, action movies are people generally mindlessly running around screaming and shooting and blowing things up. Tear of the Sun is mainly about the characters coming to grips with their situation, and its so well built-up that when the shooting and explosions come in later, they are there for more than their own sake. there is such gravity to the whole standoff at the end that it serves not as just The Action in an action movie, but the climax of everything that happened in the film before. anyway this film is highly recommended, the only weak spot imo is the script.
Rating: 
Summary: Tears rightly so...
Review: The realities of war have been rarely depicted as they have within the past few years of cinema. Tears of the Sun is another movie (such as Blackhawk Down and Saving Private Ryan) that reveals the cold truth and brutality involved in armed conflict. Granted that the movie is two hours long, we miss much of the monotony of what happens on the march or in between rest areas, but we are not spared the gross truth of mutilation and death. Where this movie lacks in character development, it makes up in heart and realism. When trying to understand what is going on here, try to look past relating to the characters and look towards trying to understand the situation that they're in - people are still dying in the continent of Africa due to ethnic cleansing, civil war, and all out racism. At times, the visions granted to the viewing audience are enough to make you grimace and look away, but we (who have not been involved in such conflict) may only imagine the intensity and dire circumstance of conflict. The extra features found here are wonderfully crafted to give us a better picture of just how real the situations in this movie are. "Voices of Africa," features testimonies from individuals hearkening from the Congo, the Sudan, Sierra Leone as well as others. Their testimonies remind us that the depictions of violence and war in this movie are not just fantasized, but that many are enduring much worse than what we are able to see. There is also an interactive map, which opens up the door to understanding some of the history of Nigeria as well as ten of her cities. The producers of this DVD have gone far beyond the normative in providing us a better context and understanding to what is happening in all of Africa and why it may be happening particularly in Nigeria. If for nothing else, purchase this DVD for the extras, but I do not believe that you will be disappointed in the movie itself. You see the mindset of soldiers change from seeing people as "packages" and as real, desperate souls who are without hope or comfort in a place such as Nigeria. We are given a glimpse of a reality that is very foreign to many of the two-hundred and ninety million of us who live in relative ease compared to much of the rest of the world.
Rating:
Summary: Tears of the Sun...Could this be based on fact?
Review: My husband and I rented this tape last night, and, although I sometimes do not ENJOY action-type films, I found myself glued
to the screen, and if I DID miss anything, I wanted him to
clue me in to what had happened in my absence. I could not keep from
wondering if some of this movie could be based on fact?
I'm sure that lots of MISSIONS are carried out by US Soldiers
such as these men, that the American public is never told about.
The horrible treatment during the ethnic cleansing in Nigeria
was just that HORRIFIC!!! It seems inconscionable to me that ANY
human being could treat another the way these poor people were treated. I DO KNOW, though, that these things DO happen EVERYDAY
in other parts of the world. Not the BEST flick I've ever seen, but it was good...very good, and very thought provoking...Well worth renting (or owning) and watching...
Rating:
Summary: Released At The Wrong Time
Review: In reading the criticisms of this movie, here and elsewhere, my response is, TEARS OF THE SUN is a militarily based action MOVIE, not a war documentary. If all such movies were done in correct and exact military fashion without any Hollywood embellishment, only military tacticians would go see them. That said, all the information you need to know to understand the background of this film is there if you look and listen for it. In the beginning, a newscaster reads, "In a land with 120 million people and over 250 ethnic groups, there has been a long-standing history of ethnic enmity. Particularly between the Fulani Muslims in the North and the Christian Ebo in the South." Soon afterward, mentioned are "ethnic cleansing," "ethnic unrest," and "control of Nigeria's vast oil supplies." What else is there to know about why the "war" is going on in the film? Also told is that the US is evacuating foreign nationals. And Monica Bellucci's character is described as being, "a critical personality," code words for "from a family with money and influence." What else do you need to know about why a Seal team goes in? The violence, gore, the emotions of the refugees and the faces of the Seals after witnessing the gore tell you the rest. The evil that men are capable of doing to other men, is something that can never be explained or understood, no matter how many expository scenes a film has. The Serbs/Croatians in Eastern Europe. The Catholics/Protestants in Ireland. The Kurds in Iraq. The Palestinians/Jews. Tibet and China. The "background" could, unfortunately, fit any number of peoples, not only those in Africa. OVERALL, a very well done movie, in terms of action, actually having a plot, and a cast that can carry it all off. I'm sure this film would have done better at the box office had it been released at another time. With all that's going on in the world these past couple of years, the last thing movie goers want to see is another film about war on foreign soil. Too bad for TEARS OF THE SUN, because it it deserved to do much, much better.
Rating: 
Summary: a complete wast of time
Review: I watched this last night with my brother, and literally after 10 minutes we were bored to death. Completely unbelievable. A Navy SEAL disobeying direct orders, the big-baby doctor, the "I'm sorry about your men" cheesy, lame dialogue, oh, it was painful. I like a good war flick...and I like thoughtful movies...but this movie was like the chameleon it showed in one of the segue shots: it just kept changing. Was it a war movie? Was it trying to make a political statement? Was it trying to feed off of America's corporate guilt for not doing anything about the numerous incidents of genocide in Africa? Was it a romance movie? It felt forced, contrived, and unrealistic. I'm sorry that watched it.
Rating:
Summary: This brought tears to my eyes
Review: At first glance, Tears of the Sun appears to be yet another war movie, but that is far from the truth. I admit that my attitude towards this movie when i first saw the preview was "seen one seen them all". I cannot tell you how wrong I was. The great thing about this movie is that not only does it have some great action sequences, but it also has an outstanding plot. Their mission is to rescue a doctor from the rebel forces who are about to attack her village. At first these stoic soldiers do not care about any of the villagers with the exception of the doctor who they have to rescue. As the soldiers witness the terrible things the rebels are capable of and how vunerable and terrified these people are, they quickly reverse their view on the entire situation and they see people as people instead of packages requied in order to complete a mission. As i said before, this movie is so much more than the typical war movie. It shows Africa at its most brutal. I recommend this movie to anyone and everyone because it is such an excellent movie.
Rating: 
Summary: Enjoyable, yet where are the characters?
Review: Tears of the Sun is a good movie because it tells an effective story. The plight of refugees in Africa suffering through tribal warfare is the star of the movie. The main characters, played by Bruce Willis as the military man leading a squadron to save a missionary doctor, played by Monical Belluci, add nothing to the movie. Belucci's character gets one line to explain her background and we learn nothing about Bruce Willis' character except that he is a soldier. What makes this movie good is the shock of seeing the suffering that the people in Nigeria can inflict on each other. Sure, we here about this stuff in America, but it isn't publicized like maybe it should be. The scene where the American soldiers liberate a village being plundered seems out of place in this action movie, but it is actually the heart of the movie. I applaud this movie for tackling a true problem realistically, but I don't think I've ever seen a movie where so little attention was paid to character development.
Rating:
Summary: As It Should Have Been
Review: I rented this movie because I wanted to see Monica Bellucci, who finally seems to be a rising star over here in North America and ended up enjoying the whole thing. I normally do not like war/gun movies but I was surprised at how much I ended up loving this film. This movie involves a team of Navy Seals who are ordered to extract a doctor, a priest and two nuns from an African country undergoing a civil war. However things hit a snag when the doctor refuses to leave the Africans who she is treating. Bruce Willis was surprisingly good, he played a military commander with stoic resolve, but who had a heart. He and his men could obviously have left the people stranded, or not have gotten involved (which was consistent with their orders). But they stepped in and did the right thing. Monica is a bombshell, but she wasn't ridiculously or inappropriately dolled up in a manner that would be inconsistent with the movie. I was surprised that throughout the entire movie she wore a button up shirt and there were no salacious shots of her cleavage. I was also surprised that the Navy SEAL unit had two Black members. One of which was played excellently by Eamon Walker. And neither of them died! While I feel that the movie was a bit manipulative at times playing on the heart strings of the audience. I will admit that it was a vast improvement over the "shoot em up" antics that occurred in Black Hawk Dawn (which felt like a giant video game) and which bored me to tears. Those who are looking for the same mindless madness and mayhem found in Black Hawk Down or the Matrix, might want to give this film a wide berth. Tears of the Sun differs from those movies in that the characters actually have depth. At times tears came to my eyes as I was reminded of how The West totally ignored and stood by while countless of Rawandans were slaughtered in the name of ethnic cleansing. While they willingly interfered when the same thing was happening in Bosnia. I guess that African (Black) lives mean nothing where the UN is concerned. I was glad to see that someone was willing to do the right thing where Africa was concerned. Even if it was only in a Hollywood movie.
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