We Were Soldiers

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Summary: Show in high schools
Review: This is a must see.A very moveing film.It touches all of the right feelings.Not a film for left wingers.

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Summary: The Greatest War movie
Review: My top 10 list is dangerously close to becoming 50% Mel Gibson movies. He seams to pick the best movies, and he's a good actor also. This movie is 95% true, and it's one hell of a story with very colorful characters. Everyone should see it just for the historical value of it.

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Summary: Another win from Mel Gibson!
Review: I went to see this movie in the wake of Sep 11, when I was still terrified my active-duty husband would be sent overseas to fight. Watching this film left me in tears, it was so profoundly powerful in its telling of the tale. I can't describe it better than that -- profound.

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Summary: One of my favorites
Review: When I saw this movie it was awesome. It starts out with a platoon of french that get massacred and then for an hour it shows the troops training and then the rest is awesome especially the end which i wont tell what happens. The hour of training may sound boring but it has great commedie like the sergent major making smart remarks.

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Summary: Mediocre patriotic film
Review: We Were Soldiers is like Braveheart in Vietnam. It's like "The Patriot" in the Valley of the Shadow of Death.
Wallace made this movie and wanted it to be THE Vietnam film. He wanted to "Get it right". Now all he accomplished is nothing more than a technically stunning, but patriotic and truth-denying Braveheart in Vietnam film.
Don't get me wrong. This film is good. But it fails at telling the story of the Vietnam War. Totally.
There are nice approaches, but the general audience - who assumingly did not study the history of Vietnam - isn't told anything about the conflict, and how the USofA ruined Vietnam and the surrounding countries.

The DVD is good. The Quality is outstanding and the extras are good. If you are into Vietnam, or war movies in general, you should get this.

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Summary: The Alamo revisited.
Review: This was one intense battle that went on around the clock, and it's amazing that the outnumbered US soldiers who fought it didn't come unglued against such odds against a well disciplined
and determined enemy. Even my wife enjoyed the movie, and she hates war flicks.

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Summary: first accurate view from hollywood of Vietnam War
Review: As an Australian Vietnam veteran, I have a close interest in the Vietnam war and books, films and articles about it. May I say that I was sceptical when I sat down to watch this much heralded film starring an expatriate aussie - Mel Gibson [whom I have met] but after viewing the DVD twice in one session, I believe it is the most accurate portrayal of how "we" approached and took on the "enemy" in South Vietnam.
I recommend this film to anyone - no matter their political persuasion or beliefs as after viewing it they ought to have gained a truer perpespective of what "we" went thru in the Vietnam conflict....

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Summary: You must read the book to!
Review: One quite night with nothing better to do I rented the most touching and most remembered movie I will ever see.(We Were Soldiers). By the end of this movie I was sitting on the edge of my seat. My uncle was in the vietnam war he was shot by a sniper fortunately he was not killed. This movie is a must see for the adults of todays world. What our boys went through over in the Ia Drang valley was a nightmare. But the herriosm these men diplayed is beyond anything this world will ever experience again. They not only fought for another country but they fought for themselves. Lt. Col Hal Moore who is now Retired Lt. Gen Hal Moore resides in my home state of Georgia (Savannah) and I am proud to have this American hero reside in my home state. I also ran to our local public library after watching this movie and rented the book We Were Soldiers Once and Young written by Hal Moore and a reporter who in the mist of all the fighting found himself right in the middle and had to lay his camera down and pick up a gun to protect himself and others, his name is Jeff Galloway. If you have not seen this movie you must! If you have not read this book you must! Because I felt for me to see this movie and also read this book was a tribute to the men who died in the Ia Drang valley (the valley of death as it was formally called). Not only did these heroic men die in the Ia Drang Valley but they were accompanied in death by 58,000 of their brothers in arms. This was such a tragedy. It really makes you stop and think about the condition our world in is today. Before you rent or buy another movie you gotta see We Were Soldiers!

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Summary: The Best of the Best!
Review: This is one of the best portrayals of the Viet Nam War I have ever seen. They really did a great job showing what the women went through at home, and that's rarely seen in a war movie. Mel Gibson is one of my favorite actors (not to mention he's a hottie with the bluest eyes I've ever seen), and he deserves an Academy Award for this one! If you haven't seen it - YOU GOTTA GET THIS ONE!

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Summary: Still Waiting for Hollywood to Get Combat Right
Review: Having read two books about the battle of Ia Drang and having corresponded occasionally with Joe Galloway, I was very excited to get my hands on the DVD of "We Were Soldiers." Maybe it was because my expectations were so high that I was ultimately disappointed in the film. I was not surprised that much of Galloway's book is missing from the film, it would have been impossible to include all the detail about each of the soldiers that makes the book so personal and powerful. I was also not disappointed by the decision to leave out the fight at LZ Albany, again in the interest of time. What bothered me were all the classic Hollywood combat cliches that made it into the film. Randall Wallace spent so much time making sure they had the correct kind of red filter on Col. Moore's flash light, but had no problem turning the North Vietnamese Regulars into screaming, banzai-charging stereotypes straight out of "Sand of Iwo Jima." Other cliches included: Enemy incapable of operational planning at all; no tactics on either side more sophisticated than suicide charges; all rear-eschelon personnel that are lying, stupid, stuffed shirts; everyone fighting shoulder to shoulder at ranges of 10 meters or less; blood squirting in slow motion from the start of the action to the end -- even when the end is three days later; explosions that are little balls of flame that don't injure anyone more than 6 feet away; soldiers wives that are all super-models; gratuitous references to George Armstrong Custer and the Little Big Horn; and finally the totally fictitious bayonet charge led by Col Moore into the NVA HQ.

Things they could have put into the film that would have improved the drama significantly: General Chu Huy Man's Western Highlands Field Front HQ planning the Tay Nguyen campaign that led to the fight in the Ia Drang valley -- this would have explained why there were 3 NVA regiments in the area and why they fought so hard; the pride the 3rd Brigade/7th Cav took in being called the Garry Owen Brigade -- this would have explained the unit esprit de corps; General Kinnard and Col. Brown's role -- this would have explained what the 3/7 was doing in the Ia Drang; more on the air and artillery liason officers who played such key roles (there was a tiny bit in the film about Batteries B & C, 1st Battn, 21st Artillery) -- this would have explained how 3 air cav battns (not one as depicted in the movie) could hold off 3 regmts for 3 days; finally and most importantly, the loneliness and isolation of the modern battlefield -- this would have explained the real heroism of the men on the ground.

I'm glad that this movie didn't fall into the stock Hollywood Vietnam War cliches recycled out of "Apocalypse Now" or "Platoon," and overall it wasn't a bad movie, but I'm still waiting for them to get combat right.