Finally saw Ridley Scott's Black Hawk Down, which came out in 2001, after 9/11. I don't know what to think about it. Scott makes impressive epic films, and this is certainly epic in showing modern urban warfare, more comprehensively than Stanley Kubrick's Full Metal Jacket (1987). The visuals and sound effects are superb. Furthermore, the 1993 street warfare and chaotic battle scenes in Mogadishu, Somalia (a city larger than Detroit), portend urban fighting in Iraq, only without the IEDs and suicide bombers.
This film dovetails perfectly with a book I just finished and will post about soon: James Hillman's A Terrible Love of War (2004). Black Hawk Down is based on Mark Bowden's 1999 nonfiction work, Black Hawk Down: A Story of Modern War.
Today's Rune: Possessions.
Today's Rune: Possessions.
7 comments:
Erik, I am a wuss and terrified of war. I couldn't even make it thru the first part of "Saving Private Ryan." Hope you are enjoying your summer!
I saw this quite a long time ago but I remember it was pretty good.
What did you think of the end credits where the 19 dead Americans were listed?
Personally I thought Scott was trying to glorify another situation we did not have the will to prosecute as a war. If we are going in to fight then we need to adopt the policy of kill them all where they stand. That is what war is, peace keeping was bullshit in Somalia.
If the combined UN forces had done the job in 1993 there may be stability there today same with Iraq and bush 1's war.
Thanks all for the comments! Jodi, that's a healthy response ;->
WM/Mark: Not sure what Scott was trying to do besides tell the story nad keep making new movies; the film begins with Plato's quip: "Only the dead have seen the end of war." It would be more balanced at the end if the names of Somali KIA were listed, too.
Own the book, and have only gotten through the first quarter (not the fault of Bowden, who's an excellent writer-- it's my own crazy schedule with limited reading time). One of the things he makes clear from the outset of the book is the racism that was underlying the mostly-white Rangers' attitudes toward the Somalians-- or "Sammies" as they called them. I haven't seen the movie-- don't want to until I've finished the book-- but it sounded like that was excised from the story.
Looking forward to reading "Killing Pablo," Bowden's account of the hunt for drug kingpin Pablo Escobar. It's also being made into a movie, coming out in 2011.
I should add that my brother, who was a Marine then, was part of that mission. It was called a "peacekeeping" mission, but there was no peace to keep. With factions fighting factions, it was a pretty untenable situation, and a dangerous one. It was heartbreaking seeing the starvation that went on, with the various factions using food as a weapon, but there was not much the West could do.
Looking back, perhaps Somalia was better off under a communist dicatorship.
Johnny, I think they call them "Skinnies" in the film, but couldn't get all of the dialogue amid the fighting.
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