Black Hawk Down Details

Following on swiftly from the release of Behind Enemy Lines, here's another noisy, gung-ho modern war movie. However, the fact that this film is based on the disastrous 1993 “Battle of Mogadishu” in Somalia does not temper its flag-waving, pro-American militarism.The film's poster tagline “Leave no man behind” disguises what was a strategic American mess as chest-beating melodrama — in reality, 18 Americans were killed, as were hundreds of Somalis during a 15-hour firefight. That it should come from a British director is the surprise, though to his credit Ridley Scott has cast many non-Americans in prominent roles — an underused Ewan McGregor, an impressive Jason Isaacs, comic turn Ewen Bremner and charismatic Eric Bana. It's sensitive, cool-headed and intelligent for a Jerry Bruckheimer movie, but for all of Scott's incredible technical skill — you really do feel as if you are there — the battle scenes lack identifiable characters and there is scant insight into the Somalian conflict. In a post-11-September world, its call for “heroes” makes it little more than a recruitment film.

A success in re-creating the experience of battle in all its violence and immediacy, this fails in any wider aim: there is no attempt to explain what the US mission hoped to achieve, or why they met with such resistance from the Somalis.