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12 Strong (2018)

Published

5 years ago

July 22, 2018

This is Afghanistan.
Graveyard of many empires.
Today you are our friend,tomorrow you are our enemy.
It won’t be any different for you.
Soon America will become just another tribe here.
You will be cowards if you leave.
And you will be our enemies if you stay.

I only asked myself one question, after seeing “12 Strong“. Why didn’t the American authorities send 1200 of those well-trained, experienced soldiers instead of this limited group of 12? Then in one fell swoop, they could have wiped out the entire Taliban and the scum that belongs to it. Now after more than 15 years, the American troops are still there and the living conditions and the political situation hasn’t improved much. I can believe that these 12 elite soldiers have made a breakthrough in the fight against the Taliban there. That the entire film is based on true facts, I also want to believe. But I think that the event between dropping these soldiers and their homecoming should be taken with a fat grain of salt. It felt like a superhero movie at certain moments and it’s the textbook example of displaying American patriotism. The latter a bit too much for my taste.

Those Taliban fighters shoot extremely bad.

Any idea how many Taliban fighters these 12 super-elite soldiers had a clear shot at? And how many were eventually sent to the afterlife, where they are awaited for by a harem of virgins, with a well-aimed shot? I lost count after a while. I’m sure that the automatic rifles of the American soldiers were equipped with an auto-aim function because the number of headshots was shockingly high. I suppose the Taliban fighters were equipped with obsolete Soviet arms or weapons from other parts of the world because their shooting skills left much to be desired. Or perhaps they had desert sand in the eyes. Or the American soldiers chose a perfect time to attack. Maybe these Muslim warriors were attacked the moment they rolled out their Persian carpet and knelt down towards Mecca for their prayers. I don’t have another explanation. Either that or they are just extremely bad at shooting.

Fighting against tanks with horses. Now that’s something different.

I did admire these elite soldiers because they had to move on horseback through this country. Nothing special, you might say. But not when you find out only one person has experience in this discipline. It’s surprising no one fell off an Afghan ridge. They also had an additional obstacle. Not only did the local warlords such as Dostum (David Negahban) thoroughly hate the Taliban regime. There was also the mutual rivalry between the various Afghan warlords. Afghans apparently all have a short fuse (stressful for suicide terrorists). However, I don’t understand how they knew at a given moment who they should shoot at, because those Muslim fighters all look identical. “12 Strong” is a war film like so many others. Apart from the fact that they go to battle on horses against a force majeure with a hypermodern weapon arsenal. This gives us impressive but at the same time dubious images. It looked like “The magnificent seven” mixed with “Hacksaw Ridge“.

Nothing will stop the chaos as long as money is involved.

The honor of being the captain of these elite troops was given to Chris Hemsworth, who played it with bravado and conviction. Mitch Nelson is an officer without war experience but with a charisma and intellect that ensures that this impossible operation is fully successful. He manages to convince a general after he interrupted him several times during his briefing (apparently this is not done in the US Army). And he manages to persuade an Afghan warlord in a decisive manner so he forgets a year-long feud for a short time and buries the battle ax briefly. “12 Strong” is certainly exciting, contains a whole series of action-packed scenes and shows in a clear way how chaotic the political situation in that country is. My personal opinion about the whole problem is of a very different nature. And many will disagree with it. Let me put it this way. I am convinced that as long as there is money to be earned from these sad conflicts, with ordinary and innocent people being the victims, these tragic conflicts won’t stop and nothing will change. Viola, my two cents.

My rating 6/10
Links: IMDB

FILM RATING

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Godzilla Minus One | Official Trailer #2

Post war Japan is at its lowest point when a new crisis emerges in the form of a giant monster, baptized in the horrific power of the atomic bomb

Published

3 weeks ago

November 6, 2023

Staff

Genre:

Action, Adventure, Drama

Release Date:

December 1, 2023

Director:

Takashi Yamazaki

Cast:

Ryunosuke Kamiki, Minami Hamabe, Yuki Yamada

Plot Summary:

Post war Japan is at its lowest point when a new crisis emerges in the form of a giant monster, baptized in the horrific power of the atomic bomb

FILM RATING

Action

The Continental Review: Not The Prequel We Needed

Published

2 months ago

October 4, 2023

Kevin Verma

Ever since Lionsgate greenlit this series in early 2017, fans of the franchise have been eagerly anticipating to see how the John Wick universe expands. 4 movies in, the John Wick franchise is widely known as one of the greatest action movie franchises of all time with our titular character (a.k.a Baba Yaga) becoming one of the most iconic and bad-ass figures ever in Hollywood. The Continental: From The World of John Wick is a prequel series that tells the story of Winston Scott and how he became the manager of New York’s The Continental branch.

The miniseries was developed by Greg Coolidge, Kirk Ward and Shawn Simmons. It is executive produced by Paul Wernick, Rhett Reese, Derek Kolstad, David Leitch and Chad Stahelski, the director of all four John Wick movies. It is structured as a 3-night event told through three 90-minute episodes. The series was originally supposed to air on Starz, but the network sold it to Peacock in 2022. After 6 years in development, it finally aired on Peacock this September.

A lot has been made of the subtitle of the project ever since it was announced. The fact that the makers needed to include it says a lot about the show. It almost felt like the prime marketing asset for it many times as the other promotional material didn’t necessarily create a lot of hype for the show. Albert Hughes directed the first and third episodes, while Charlotte Branstrom directed the second, and disappointingly both directors do not bring the same novelty or creative prowess that Chad Stahelski managed to bring in the John Wick movies.

The show also surprisingly lacks any real star power. This franchise is one of Lionsgate’s most prized assets, so you would imagine that they would make sure to get a big cast and crew for this prequel miniseries, but they didn’t. Colin Woodell as Winston Scott is the clear standout among the cast despite delivering only a decent performance, which says a lot about the acting standards in this 3-episode miniseries. Many have criticized the casting of Mel Gibson in the series, but I personally had no issue with his performance and he’s also the most recognizable member of the cast despite having no real audience pull anymore.

The writing doesn’t offer too much to ponder upon or any seriously shocking turns in the story as most of the focus is on making the product as epic, badass and action-packed as possible. Some of the characters had some interesting layers to them, especially Charon (Ayomide Adegun) and Lou (Jessica Allain). Lemmy (Adam Shapiro) provides some much-needed comic relief with his witty dialogues. The structuring of the story works really well as a 3-night event which sets the high stakes and sets a standard of intensity for the narrative.

But the thing that people were most looking forward to, was the action and how it fared against John Wick. Unfortunately, that department was inconsistent as well. Ben Robson’s fight sequence in the early part of the first episode was great and it makes you optimistic that the action would get better from here on, but it never does. Most of the action blocks here involve explosions and guns rather than the hand-to-hand combat John Wick franchise is known for. Some of the action was awesome and some of it sadly wasn’t.

The Continental: From the World of John Wick brings a lot of glamour as it tries to expand its world but fails to engage with its paper-thin plot. The characters are mostly dull with a formulaic villain and misses the presence of a magnetic protagonist like Wick. A prequel about Wick’s backstory would’ve been much more interesting than this inconsistent prequel event saved by its style and some great action. It has almost enough to be its own thing but doesn’t quite have enough to match its parent movies.

The Continental: From the World of John Wick premieres on Peacock in the US and Prime Video in the UK and Australia on 22 September, with new episodes weekly.