Pasi Nurminen
Deity
The War Series franchise has come a long way since its humble beginnings in World War One. Quite frankly, that first film was one of the best, but if the producers knew that what they were making would eventually result in the Iraq War, they might have changed a few things. After watching just one scene involving Rumsfelds character, they might have even abandoned the entire venture purely out of principle.
World War Two was the shining moment for the franchise. The Hitler character was by far the greatest villain in movie history, and the way he stabbed the Stalin character in the back was a magnificent plot twist that not a single person saw coming. The stiff upper lip Churchill character almost made me feel proud to be British, and Im Canadian. The battles were terrific, huge clashes of steel all across the world. They even managed to throw in a character (Mussolini) solely for plucky comic relief. Inside sources say that Mussolinis ineptitude was nothing more than an inside joke the writers played on one of the producers who was Italian. Either way, it worked. World War Two even had the single greatest explosions in movie history, right near the end against the Japanese, ending the movie on a spectacularly high note.
Then they came along and produced the turd that was the Vietnam War. Poorly directed, with no well defined enemy, and leaps of logic so obscene that even an Olympic gymnast would struggle to keep up. I wont go into great detail here since it was so horrifically bad. It was panned by critics who said it wasnt a real war, just a bunch of jungle ambushes that really lowered the standards for the franchise.
After the abysmal failure of the Vietnam War at the box office, its no surprise that they decided to produce the Iraq War as a miniseries as opposed to a feature film. Right off the bat they hit you with a glaring continuity error: the domino theory discussed in the previous film apparently hasnt materialized, which casts serious doubt on the Iraq War makers credibility in the first place. The first few episodes are taken up by boring bureaucratic maneouvres as the lead characters plea their case for war, which in any other franchise would be enough to turn off the television immediately. Given the strong past this franchise has demonstrated, I held my tongue until later episodes.
Unfortunately, the problems in the last installment are present here tenfold. If you thought the Vietnam War was poorly directed, this one has lowered the bar even further. Theyve only gone through one director so far, unlike Vietnams three (Kennedy, Johnson, Nixon), but by God they need to drop the axe now and replace him.
First of all, every good action film must have a compelling villain that poses a genuine threat. In this war, we were given a pudgy little midget with a beret who writes crappy romance novels. Were supposed to feel threatened by that? What happened to crazed madmen hell bent on wiping the Earth of virtually all its population like in World War II? Even worse, he dies midway through it, and all were left with is some shadowy bunch of terrorists. The threat from these terrorists is never defined, which gives the audience absolutely no reason to sympathize with the heroes after Hussein is dead, and thats if anyone sympathized with them in the first place.
Second, the actors are just atrocious. They used to know how to use one-liners, but in this day and age were reduced to stuff like we will be greeted as liberators, the insurgency is in its last throes, or the ever so lame major combat operations have ended. The worst part about such dialogue that the series is full of is that its so damn confusing. Is it supposed to make us laugh? Cry? Froth with rage? You just dont know, but it could be any one of those at that vacant look every single actor constantly has on his or her face when theyre on camera. Its as if the writers thing that a few false platitudes and cheap smiles will get us to tune in and give them rave reviews. Snore.
Third, the action. Its an action film, so were expecting some action. What do we get instead? A few explosions every now and then, but very tiny ones. We get a death rate of about 4 or 5 per day, and soccer moms around the country demanding that it be cancelled on the grounds that its way too violent? This from the same movie going demographic that saw 60 million people slaughtered in a single film (World War Two) and flocked to see it in record numbers? I cant actually blame the director for this; if he made it too violent, even more people would likely be pissed off.
Fourth, big budget syndrome clearly got the best of them here. Its plainly obvious that they spent the most money of any of the War series films. One has to admit, that the picture quality is the best of them all, the tanks, infantry, and aircraft are crisply and realistically portrayed on film. Whats bad about this kind of spending is that they also clearly have the notion that they can thatch together a weak plot with no compelling characters and well buy it as long as they threw a whole bunch of money at the whole enterprise. This is whats wrong with the state of war today. You cannot simply throw money at it and expect us to buy it.
Overall, Id say the Iraq War gets a 1.5 out of 10 so far. Rumours have been kicking around that the series is going to be cancelled with the last episode similar to the way Vietnam ended, so dont count on anything good to come out of its final episodes.
World War Two was the shining moment for the franchise. The Hitler character was by far the greatest villain in movie history, and the way he stabbed the Stalin character in the back was a magnificent plot twist that not a single person saw coming. The stiff upper lip Churchill character almost made me feel proud to be British, and Im Canadian. The battles were terrific, huge clashes of steel all across the world. They even managed to throw in a character (Mussolini) solely for plucky comic relief. Inside sources say that Mussolinis ineptitude was nothing more than an inside joke the writers played on one of the producers who was Italian. Either way, it worked. World War Two even had the single greatest explosions in movie history, right near the end against the Japanese, ending the movie on a spectacularly high note.
Then they came along and produced the turd that was the Vietnam War. Poorly directed, with no well defined enemy, and leaps of logic so obscene that even an Olympic gymnast would struggle to keep up. I wont go into great detail here since it was so horrifically bad. It was panned by critics who said it wasnt a real war, just a bunch of jungle ambushes that really lowered the standards for the franchise.
After the abysmal failure of the Vietnam War at the box office, its no surprise that they decided to produce the Iraq War as a miniseries as opposed to a feature film. Right off the bat they hit you with a glaring continuity error: the domino theory discussed in the previous film apparently hasnt materialized, which casts serious doubt on the Iraq War makers credibility in the first place. The first few episodes are taken up by boring bureaucratic maneouvres as the lead characters plea their case for war, which in any other franchise would be enough to turn off the television immediately. Given the strong past this franchise has demonstrated, I held my tongue until later episodes.
Unfortunately, the problems in the last installment are present here tenfold. If you thought the Vietnam War was poorly directed, this one has lowered the bar even further. Theyve only gone through one director so far, unlike Vietnams three (Kennedy, Johnson, Nixon), but by God they need to drop the axe now and replace him.
First of all, every good action film must have a compelling villain that poses a genuine threat. In this war, we were given a pudgy little midget with a beret who writes crappy romance novels. Were supposed to feel threatened by that? What happened to crazed madmen hell bent on wiping the Earth of virtually all its population like in World War II? Even worse, he dies midway through it, and all were left with is some shadowy bunch of terrorists. The threat from these terrorists is never defined, which gives the audience absolutely no reason to sympathize with the heroes after Hussein is dead, and thats if anyone sympathized with them in the first place.
Second, the actors are just atrocious. They used to know how to use one-liners, but in this day and age were reduced to stuff like we will be greeted as liberators, the insurgency is in its last throes, or the ever so lame major combat operations have ended. The worst part about such dialogue that the series is full of is that its so damn confusing. Is it supposed to make us laugh? Cry? Froth with rage? You just dont know, but it could be any one of those at that vacant look every single actor constantly has on his or her face when theyre on camera. Its as if the writers thing that a few false platitudes and cheap smiles will get us to tune in and give them rave reviews. Snore.
Third, the action. Its an action film, so were expecting some action. What do we get instead? A few explosions every now and then, but very tiny ones. We get a death rate of about 4 or 5 per day, and soccer moms around the country demanding that it be cancelled on the grounds that its way too violent? This from the same movie going demographic that saw 60 million people slaughtered in a single film (World War Two) and flocked to see it in record numbers? I cant actually blame the director for this; if he made it too violent, even more people would likely be pissed off.
Fourth, big budget syndrome clearly got the best of them here. Its plainly obvious that they spent the most money of any of the War series films. One has to admit, that the picture quality is the best of them all, the tanks, infantry, and aircraft are crisply and realistically portrayed on film. Whats bad about this kind of spending is that they also clearly have the notion that they can thatch together a weak plot with no compelling characters and well buy it as long as they threw a whole bunch of money at the whole enterprise. This is whats wrong with the state of war today. You cannot simply throw money at it and expect us to buy it.
Overall, Id say the Iraq War gets a 1.5 out of 10 so far. Rumours have been kicking around that the series is going to be cancelled with the last episode similar to the way Vietnam ended, so dont count on anything good to come out of its final episodes.
The war was won a long time ago, pasi:
It was my favorite.
