>>REVIEW
THE GREAT RAID
STARRING Benjamin Bratt, James Franco and Connie Neilsen
DIRECTED BY John Dahl
Opens Friday, August 12
Check listings
It was the most daunting military rescue you’ve probably never heard of.
In 1945, the sixth Ranger Battalion, stationed in the Philippines, set out to free more than 500 American soldiers from a Japanese PoW compound in Cabanatuan. The captives had been at the mercy of their vicious tormentors for three years. The fact that any had managed to survive the horrific ordeal was amazing in itself. But the rescue effort – your basic David versus Goliath scenario with a small sliver of Army Rangers taking on a massive chunk of the Japanese army – was remarkable.
A true tale that oozes courage, valour and all the other fancy terms that give any war aficionado goose pimples, this little-known chapter of the Second World War deserves a rousing recounting on the big screen – I’m just not sure The Great Raid is it.
Aussie director John Dahl has wonderful intentions in mimicking the melodramatic wartime classics of yesteryear – the look alone of The Great Raid is enough to make one believe that John Wayne will swagger by at any moment. And come to think of it, given the lightweights carrying this thing out, the Duke would’ve been a welcome addition.
Led by Lt.-Col. Henry Mucci (a rather emotionless Benjamin Bratt), the inexperienced battalion includes baby-faced Capt. Robert Prince (James Franco), who is assigned the mammoth chore of designing a plan to bring the boys home. Both actors give performances that border on laughable, although their stilted work is likely Dahl’s insistence on keeping all things 1940s, thus, even sensible thespian instincts get swallowed by rah-rah nostalgia. At least, I’m hoping that’s the case for poor Joseph Fiennes who limps (literally) through his role as Maj. Gibson, a malaria-stricken PoW.
The Great Raid didn’t need a make-believe romantic subplot between Gibson and real-life hero Margaret Utinsky (Connie Nielsen), who bravely smuggled medicine and food to the prisoners. Cripes, didn’t Michael Bay’s Pearl Harbor teach this crew anything? When you’re knee deep in such a compelling history lesson, the last thing anyone wants to see is a fictional Harlequin-style fling. Just the facts, and make ’em good – which brings us to the best part of this movie.
The climactic prison break is awesome – a booming, artillery-stuffed showdown that, thanks to some crisp editing, has to rank up there with some of the better battle scenes ever re-created for the screen.
Like Fiennes and his pals, The Great Raid was a movie in desperate need of a rescue, and man, did those guys packing bazookas come through. Big time. |
Copyright ©2005 FFWD. All rights reserved.