Not just another war film. Review on Black Hawk Down Movie

Only the dead have seen the end of war

Plato

Black Hawk Down: A Story of Modern War was written by Mark Bowden, a reporter for the Philadelphia Inquirer. A book covering the actual events of a botched incursion into the enemy terrain of civil war torn Mogadishu, Somalia. Many lives were lost and many soldiers displayed bravery beyond the call of duty. It is a testimony of the American soldiers way. Leave no man behind.

Behind the scenes:

Director: Ridley Scott

Producers: Jerry Bruckenheimer and Ridley Scott

Music: Hans Zimmer

Screenwriter: Ken Nolan

Director of Photography: Slawomir Idziak

Cast:

Josh Hartnett is Eversmann

Ewan MacGregor is Grimes

Eric Bana is Hoot

Jason Issacs is Steele

Orlando Bloom is Blackburn

Ian Virgo is Waddell

Gabriel Casseus is Kurth

Sam Shepard is Garrison

Hugh Dancy is Schmid

Jeremy Pirien is Wolcott

Nikolaj Coster-Waldau is Gary Gordon

Johnny Strong is Shughart

Ron Eldard is Durant

Brain Van Holt is Struecker

The year is 1992. Mogadishu, Somalia is at civil war which has already claimed 300,000 lives. General Mohamed Farrah Aidid is the war lord and leader of the armed militia. His weapon of choice is hunger. He is confiscating international food supplies and starving the people; killing innocent and unarmed civilians along the way.

An elite group of U.S. army soldiers called Rangers and Delta Force are sent in to rein in the terror of General Aidid. The leader of the mission is Major General William F. Garrison.

When a local informant for this mission brings them the information that a meeting of General Aidids top henchmen is to take place, Garrison organizes an incursion into enemy territory to secure the meeting place and extract all suspects within. A regiment of ground and air forces set out to the meeting place in Bakara Market, a well-known General Aidid controlled area.

Scheduled to begin at 1500 hours, the operation goes smoothly. However, this is enemy terrain and one cannot predict the maneuvers of the enemy. Among the air forces are Little Birds and Black Hawks (both army helicopters). When a Black Hawk is shot down, all troupes are re-directed to bring in the men from the fallen chopper. A chopper with five soldiers in the heart of the enemy city with tens of thousands of armed civilians bearing down on them creates a somber picture and the rescue team has to move swiftly.

What ensues are scenes of horror and desolation. Soldiers trapped in a hostile city where the rescue troops can’t get to them. As one scene dissolves into the next, one wonders if any of the soldiers are going to make it out of there alive. One pilot, Durant, is taken as a POW by General Aidids man, possibly the only one who survived the crash and the manic crowd.

Fifteen hours later, another Black Hawk down and the fight seems unending. An overnight stay was not planned for. The death toll is mounting and they are running low on ammunition and emergency medical supplies.

Garrisons several attempts to extract them out of the enemy zone have failed until he finally convinces the Pakistani forces to intervene and amidst some carpet bombing and skillful ground tactics, they are able to pull out the remaining soldiers from the city. The armored cars are full of dead and dying soldiers, so the remaining must walk/run to safety. This later came to be termed as the Mogadishu Mile where amidst gunfire and extreme bravery, the American soldiers made it to the safety of the Pakistani stadium.

This is merely the gist of this two hour movie. Words are not enough to condense all the events of that fateful day. Blood and body parts, dead children and soldiers, impossible situations and daring missions are what culminate to make Black Hawk Down and Oscar winning tribute to the soldiers of a war that wasn’t even their own. What makes it all more moving is the fact that these events actually took place. Mark Bowden took the events of that day from the back pages of the American newspapers and gave the soldiers their due recognition.

Hans Zimmer has once again outdone himself with the musical score for this movie. He has combined North African and American music to create the perfect effect where words are not enough. The movies music is truly touching and is perfectly blended into the scenes.

The movie would not have been what it is today without the director of photography, Slawomir Idziak. The superb and unique angles of his camera and the graphic details of each scene brings to the forefront the reality of war. Along with the special effects team, they come together to create and give us the full impact of a war zone.

Each character cannot be given a special mention in this film as one man alone was not responsible for its success. The cast worked as a team to tell us how brave these soldiers were. It is an enormous task trying do justice to the men who fought valiantly on that day in October of 1993 and there is no doubt that these actors did them full justice.

Ken Nolan and Mark Bowden worked together to write the screenplay for the movie. They faced the challenging task of compiling a fifteen hour firefight into a two hour movie.

There are some memorable dialogues and scenes in the film. One of which I would like to conclude with is:

Eversmann: Nobody has to be a hero. It just sometimes turns out that way.