Lone Survivor

Sometimes it's a mistake to watch the extras of a DVD. Lone Survivor, directed by Peter Berg, is an above-average war film, with almost nonstop, pulse-pounding action and superb editing. But, on the other hand, in telling the true story of a Navy Seal who was the only survivor of a failed op to capture a Taliban leader, the film puts the viewer in the position of having to feel some kind of swelling patriotism. It's like fans at Yankee Stadium being forced to sing "God Bless America."

The DVD extras bend over backwards paying tribute to the fallen Seals who are represented on screen. That's all well and good, but when we are told repeatedly that the director and actors "had to get it right," I felt a little queasy. This is a movie, not a documentary, and while I appreciate the families of those who lost their lives wanted to see their sons represented accurately, this was a film for mass consumption. Lone Survivor edges too far into jingoism. I'm no supporter of the Taliban, for sure, but the black and white nature of the film was off-putting.

The film recounts Operation Red Wings, which had four seals, played by Mark Wahlberg, Ben Foster, Taylor Kitsch, and Emile Hirsch, being dropped in to take out a Taliban leader who had just killed 20 Marines. They are discovered by three goatherds, and a debate takes place over what to do with them. Kitsch, as the senior officer, lets them go and aborts the mission, but the goatherds scramble down the mountain and soon our heroes are surrounded and vastly outnumbered. They get in a shooting fight, and before Wahlberg is the only man left many Taliban are killed (some of this looked a bit too much like a video game).

Wahlberg ends up being taken in by friendly Afghans, to whom he owes his life. This part kind of got to me, because at least the film showed that not every Muslim in the world hates Americans. There was even some humor here, as when Wahlberg asks a small boy for a knife, and the boy returns with a waterfowl. "That's not a knife, that's a fucking duck," Walhberg says, exasperated.

The film opens with Navy Seals in training. These guys are tough--I wouldn't have lasted two minutes when I was their age--and I'm thankful that they're there when they need them. What these four guys went through is brutal. Not only were they all shot several times, but they survived not one but two ass-over-tea kettle falls down a mountain slope. But I'm also leery of anything that plays to patriotism--as Oscar Wilde said, "Patriotism is a virtue of the vicious."