BEHIND ENEMY LINES
Starring:
Gene Hackman, Owen Wilson, Valdimir Mashkov and Joaquim de Almeida
Director: John Moore
Running Time: 106 mins
Certificate: 15
Out to buy on DVD 2nd September
On a routine reconnaissance flight over Bosnia, a US F-18 Hornet is shot down for reasons unknown. With the peace process on a knife-edge Admiral Reigart (Hackman), who is in command of the aircraft carrier Karl Vincent, is powerless to help his downed pilot. Running for his life, Lt. Chris Burnett (Wilson) has to evade capture and make it to the pickup point. What he doesn't know is that a whole Bosnian squadron is on tail and a lone Tracker (Mashkov) has him marked.
In a time when US audiences are craving for anything remotely patriot, this movie seems perfectly timed. Going back to the brass MTV style of representing war on the big screen after the gritty realism of Saving Private Ryan and The Thin Red Line, this has more in common with Top Gun and Three Kings. Slow-mo's, sweeping camera shots, hand-helds and lots and lots of helicopter fly-bys combine to give you an in your face feel that seems to sometimes leave believability at the door. For a film that is trying to get across a strong message, it acts more like Navy-pilot recruitment advert.
The performances of Owen Wilson and Gene Hackman are the movie's saving grace. As you'd expect, they get the most out of the limited script and Hackman commands your attention whenever he graces the big screen.
Overly patriotic and trying far to hard to be the next Three Kings, this is popcorn war that never really taxes the brain but is enjoyable throwaway fun.
Audio Commentary by director John Moore and editor Martin Smith, Audio Commentary by producers John Davis and Wick Godfrey, HBO Behind-the-scenes featurette, 4 Deleted/Extended scenes and 4 alternative sequences of key scenes + Dolby Digital 5.1 and dts
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