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Brian De Palma’s underwhelming “Causalities of War”
probably deserved a better fate at the box-office as well
as better critical reaction but coming in the wake of a
slew of war films, dulled much of the impact of this film.
The film’s flawed ending and overuse of songs from the era
blunts the powerful drama at the core of this film. David
Rabe’s screenplay paints the characters in broad strokes
effectively eliminating any possible complexity to the characters
that drive the film. Their lack of moral complexity undermines
the film reminding me more of the straight ahead b-movie
war pictures of the 40’s and 50’s and lacking any sense
of subtly or depth. This extended edition adds a bi t more
gore and character touches to the original film and does
enhance it but can’t overcome a crippled screenplay and
some ham fisted direction from De Palma. ***
De Palma’s set pieces work nicely and the performances
by Penn & Fox are startling. Based on a true story that
first appeared as a magazine article the film is set during
the Vietnam War and stars Michael J. Fox as PFC Sven Ericksson
who has just arrived fresh faced in the theater of war.
Under the command of Sgt. Meserve (Sean Penn) Ericksson
finds himself at odds with his comarads when his commanding
officer takes a Vietnamese girl (Thuy Thu Le) from a village.
Meserve believes she is a member of the VC which is fighting
against the U.S. for North Vietnam. Meserve then orders
his men to rape the girl as a bizarre form of revenge against
the killing of one of his men. Meserve then murders her.
Ericksson refuses to participate and this to his commanding
officers which results in him being ostracized from other
soldiers for doing the right thing.
Image & Sound:
Featuring a solid rich looking transfer the image quality
is extremely good with the picture occasionally going soft
in some sequences. Overall the image quality is extremely
good capturing the rich green foliage of the jungle perfectly.
The 5.1 transfer of the audio is powerful with nice use
of the surround channels and quite a bit of detail evident.
The dialogue comes across clean and clear even in scenes
where there is a lot of sound effects in the background.
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