ZERO DARK THIRTY

Columbia Pictures

Rated R

Running time: 157 Minutes



Click below to watch the Zero Dark Thirty trailer.



In Columbia Pictures Zero Dark Thirty, CIA operative Jessica Chastain conducts a decade long search for Osama Bin Laden after the events of 9/11.

Based on the actual events, and directed by Kathryn Bigelow, this film is more of a drama than a war movie. It is very similar in feel to Argo, especially with Kyle Chandler playing similar roles in both movies, although Argo was a more suspenseful film.

After the opening of 911 calls of 9/11, young CIA operative Jessica Chastain spends her entire career interrogating various detainees to the whereabouts of terrorist leader Osama Bin Laden, or Usamah Bin Laden - otherwise known as UBL. Most of the movie dealt with the years of pursuing leads to Bin Laden, until they finally located the compound where Bin Laden is. Considering how long it took in pursuing those leads during the decade, it made me impatient for the movie to get to the scenes with the U.S. Navy SEALs.

In actuality Zero Dark Thirty was originally about the unsuccessful decade-long manhunt for Bin Laden - and had to be rewritten after the news story of Bin Laden being killed. I think the original story would have been very depressing and unsatisfying to watch for a movie. As a movie, the reality of Bin Laden being killed is more satisfying to experience as a movie-goer. Not that I am promoting killing people, but that the bad guy getting justice was very satisfying in a movie setting. It is curious that the sequence on the raid on Bin Laden's compound is only a few minutes less than the actual SEAL assault. I liked that the stealth Black Hawk helicopters used in the assault came from the secret aerial base Area 51. and the GPNVG-18 (Ground Panoramic Night Vision Goggles) made the SEALs look like bug-eyed aliens. The SEALs added a sense of normalcy to the movie on their downtime. Although I was not happy that the movie did not show the SEALs training on a mock up of Bin Laden's compound.

Zero Dark 30 means the very early morning hours when it is still dark outside and most people are asleep, and is usually said as "oh dark thirty" in the military. This was basically the time when the assault by the SEALs on Bin Laden took place as the assault took place at night.

While the torture scenes in the movie were bad, they were not as graphic as what I have seen in other movies with torture. This was a surprise to me, as due to all the publicity and protests about the torture scenes in the movie, I was expecting something really graphic. I don't know if that means that the U.S. is nicer in their treatment of prisoners than the rest of the world or that Hollywood is pretty sick in making movies. These scenes were especially relevant with a news clip of the President of the United States Barack Obama denying that the U.S. employs torture.

At the end of the movie, during the end credits, there was a dedication to the 9/11 victims and the victims of the various terrorist activities, like the Islamabad Marriott Hotel bombing and the Forward Operating Base Chapman bombing, since then.

Rated R for violence, language, nudity. Running time: 157 Minutes.

Pancho 
All people smile in the same language.

Pancho's Movie Reviews

ACT OF VALOR

Relativity Media

Rated R

Running Time 111 Minutes



Click below to watch the trailer of Act of Valor.



In Relativity Media's Act of Valor, a Navy Seal team goes on a personnel recovery mission to recover an abducted CIA agent Roselyn Sanchez. The SEALs then search around the world for the terrorists responsible for Sanchez's kidnapping before the terrorists bring their terrorism back home to our country America.

Using active duty U.S. Navy SEALs as the Seal team makes the tactics and action of the SEALs incredibly real. We get to see the weapons and equipment the SEALs currently use on combat deployment, as well as seeing the SEALSs support equipment and their support personnel. The use of the Special Operations Craft-Riverine warboats with active duty Special Warfare Combatant-craft Crewmen, or SWCC, was my favorite part of the movie - especially the way the warboats came charging in for the hot extraction of the SEALs. The film took two years to make as the producers had to work around the SEALs deployments. Watching the SEALs in action made me appreciate the SEALs more for all of the sacrifices the SEALs go through for protecting our country - especially when you consider the SEALs motto is "The only easy day was yesterday."

With the movie having assistance from U.S. Navy personnel and the Naval Special Warfare Command, I can appreciate that this movie is an authentic action film as the SEALs, while in the process of making the film, would not do anything in the movie that was not real and authentic - like the infiltration scenes of their objective areas. I am glad they had water operations that the SEALs were able to do in the movie, since they are Navy SEALs. A lot of the SEALs action scenes were first person shooter scenes where you see through the eyes of the SEAL as they look for targets, especially during night vision scenes. It was great seeing the uploaded camera feed from the UAV for the SEALs to use for intelligence. In other movies, this kind of information appears to come from satellite reconnaissance imagery. This kind of information coming from UAV's is much more believable. The graphics of the locations around the world was a nice idea. Then the graphics would then zoom into the location of the scene - but would sometimes zoom in the opposite direction than what you would expect, which was disorientating.

Having the computer graphics of the team members records makes for a cool introductions, but outside of the team leaders, you do not get to know the team as people - and even then, it was hard for me to tell the leaders apart, since they both looked and sounded alike and had no characterization, except for the fact that one was going to be a father. His story and family life was the basis for the framing story in their civilian lives, as their spouses and children sacrifice so much to support them. The SEALs acting, when they were acting instead of being SEALS, was not that great - but then they are SEALs and not actors. Alex Veadov was more relatable to me as the bad guy than with the SEALs acting as characters. What does come across in the film with the SEALs are the SEALs brotherhood for each other - that they would die for each other. The fictional story is pretty much like it came out of today's breaking news headlines - especially since the story is basically an amalgamation of several SEAL operations.

As a Filipino, I was both proud and saddened that the Philippines and Filipinos were involved in some of the action in the movie. Unfortunately, such things can happen in places like the Philippines in the real world.

At the end of the movie, the audience applauded. The film also listed at the end of the movie the members of the SEALs who gave their lives since 9/11. Sadly, as of 2012, there were a lot of names listed of SEALs who gave their lives. There were much more names on the list than I would have thought would be listed. Considering how good the SEALs were when depicted in the intense action scenes in the movie on what they do, it makes you realize how many intense operations the elite Seal teams have been deployed on over the years to accrue that many causalities. No wonder the Seals have such an intense brotherhood amongst themselves. Over the end credits were pictures of Americana and the real-life heroes who protect our freedom.

"To them and those like them. Damn few."

Rated R for graphic war violence. Running Time: 111 Minutes.

Click below to watch the documentary of Act of Valor.



Pancho
All people smile in the same language.

Pancho's Movie Reviews