Colonel Hayes Hodges: You ever had a pissed-off Marine on your ass?
National Security Advisor William Sokal: Is that a threat?
Colonel Hayes Hodges: Oh, yes, sir.
With debate continuing about the role of American troops in overseas situations such as Kosovo, the new film, "Rules of Engagement," has a current events timeliness to it.
This court-martial drama, directed by William Friedkin, is a movie in which ambiguity would have been an asset.
Samuel L. Jackson plays Col. Terry Childers a Marine veteran sent with a detachment of men to the U.S. Embassy in Yemen to evacuate its personnel.
The embassy is under siege with crowds throwing rocks and Molotov cocktails at the compound, while snipers are firing into the buildings.
After three of Childers' men are killed, he orders his men to fire - not at the snipers - but into the crowd because he claims he sees them brandishing weapons and firing up at his men. In the ensuing action, 83 civilians, including old men, women and children, are killed by the Marines and more than 100 people are wounded.
Public outcry calls for Childers' head and the U.S. government decides to make him the sacrificial lamb and court-martial him.
Childers chooses as his counsel Col. Hays Hodges (Tommy Lee Jones), a longtime friend. The two served together in Vietnam and Childers saved Hodges life.
Hodges, who has had drinking problems as well as other personal woes, admits he is not a very good lawyer and urges his friend to get someone else to defend him.
But Childers is adamant, and Hodges accepts the assignment.
The interplay between the two veterans makes for compelling drama.
Where "Rules of Engagement" fails is in the script, which employs the tired device of a smarmy government official - the head of the National Security Council played by Bruce Greenwood - who has a tape showing the demonstrators with weapons. It's the old government coverup scam, which has become a tired cliche.
The tape would exonerate Childers, but not help the United States in the world court of public opinion, so he has it destroyed.
"Rules of Engagement" would have been a much better and more thoughtful drama if the entire tape subplot had been eliminated or if we were not shown scenes of the protesters firing their weapons.
This is one movie that would have benefited from making the audience decide if Childers took the correct course of action.
The outcome of the court-martial is diluted because of the tape plot device.
However, the strong performances by Jackson and Jones are the movie's main asset. The two actors exude charisma and are fun to watch.
Jackson, ramrod straight, his eyes blazing is all semper fi, while Jones is more subdued and vulnerable as the physically and mentally wounded veteran.
Guy Pearce, best remembered from "L.A. Confidential," is the firebrand Marine prosecutor out to convict Childers. The Australian Pearce has adopted an accent that makes him sound a bit like Matt Damon.
"Rules of Engagement" is a flawed picture. There are a few slow spots; it could have used some tighter editing.
At a little over two hours, the movie drags a bit. Among the film's other shortcomings is Friedkin's obsession with squibs.
Mostly everyone who takes a bullet does so in slow-mo as blood erupts in a cascade of spurting red.
It's an unnecessary cliché from the 1970s.
The movie, though, is entertaining and thoughtful. It could have used a bit more backbone, which would have made it an even better drama.
By : Bob Bloom
Source: rec.art.movies.reviews newsgroup
Rating: 3
Fast paced, decidedly lowbrow and gory enough to ensure an `R' rating, Rules of Engagement is the most recent installment in Hollywood's oldest and most classic genre: The Popcorn Flick. The acting is good, plot holes many and concession stand just down the hall.
Colonel Terry Childers (Samuel Jackson) and Colonel Hayes Hodges (Tommy Lee Jones) served together in Vietnam where Childers saved Hodges' life. 28 years later, Childers has been through Beirut and Desert Storm while Hodges has been through Georgetown Law. Before they both retire from the United States Marine Corps, there is one last war to be fought.
While on a mission in Yemen to save the US Ambassador and his family from hostile Islamic Fundamentalists protesting outside the embassy, Childers witnesses the death of three of his marines as the armed crowd fires at his squad. Following the rules of engagement and recognizing that an armed civilian is no longer a civilian, Childers orders his men to open fire on the rowdy protesters. Soon 89 Yemenis are dead and over a hundred others injured. But for Childers, his mission has been accomplished: he rescued the ambassador, saved as many of his men as possible and defused a unruly situation through the necessary means (needless to say, the movie has some issues establishing him as the genuine good-guy that he is supposed to be). Imagine his surprise when he returns to the United States to learn that the National Security Advisor is leading a political cover up and has decided that a) the massacred crowd was unarmed (not many people have to be hushed for such an allusion to be created) and b) Childers should stand murder charges for shooting unarmed civilians.
Hodges owes his life to Childers and he will now have an opportunity to repay that enormous debt in front of a court marshal. But first he will have to convince himself that he is a worthy attorney, resolve a long-standing yet unspoken conflict with his decorated father (there's a new one!) and stop drinking (Tommy Lee Jones as a struggling alcoholic - who would have thought?).
The movie's opening scene, set in the unruly jungles of Vietnam, is among the more graphic that can be found in a primarily non-war film. But this is necessary as the Childers character is established via the Asian war. And although the gore might be more than what one wishes to see in a Hollywood film, give credit for such reality to Platoon and Saving Private Ryan's Dale Dye, the film's military technical adviser, who served 20 years in the Marines (some of which were spent in that Vietnamese setting) before taking to the more glamorous life that Hollywood provides.
Islamic supporters will likely be just as outraged at this film as they were at 1998's The Siege, a movie they elected to picket nationwide. A critical scene has Islamic propaganda spewing anti-Western sentiments, just an example of the general stereotyping that paints the faith as being based on terrorism. Even Islamic women and children are made to look bad at times.
Tommy Lee Jones and Samuel L. Jackson certainly don't wander into any new territory with their roles here. Jones just had a similar part in last year' s Double Jeopardy and Jackson gives an encore of his performance from The Negotiator. Together, they make yet another excellent semi-action/semi-drama duo that will likely go largely unnoticed come awards season (past examples include John Travolta and Nicholas Cage for Face/Off, Samuel L. Jackson and Kevin Spacey for The Negotiator and numerous James Bond good-guy/bad-guy duos).
Unfortunately, some plot holes are far greater than those normally pardoned in action films. A key witness is never called even though he is never hushed, some simple trajectory tests that could end the trial are never bothered with and a man standing trial for murder is never put behind bars for reasons not clearly explained. Also, the film uses a cheap out-technique when displaying white cards at the end to tie up some loose ends that would have well been worth another 30 minutes. With the exception of documentaries and films that have a smoother ending than this one, such cards should never be needed.
Well, Hollywood's oldest institution has grown over time. Concession stands no longer offer a genuine butter topping and you are naturally on the edge-of-your seat during a film because the seats are too small in which to sit back. Still, Rules of Engagement fits the modern requirements rather well -– plenty of action, court room suspense, good acting, a few errors and a predictable ending –- and you will be hard pressed to find better kernels popping elsewhere.
By : Mac VerStandig
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