Black Hawk Down (2001)

Director: Ridley Scott
Starring: Josh Hartnett, Ewan McGregor, Tom Sizemore

Synopsis:
A task force of US Army Rangers and Delta Force operators become trapped in hostile territory during a botched attempt to capture high value targets in Mogadishu.

Impressions:
I was in the Army when this came out and I remembered all the enthusiasm for it. (I was decried as a nerd for looking forward to Attack of the Clones instead. In retrospect, my enthusiasm was perhaps misplaced.) If you want an example of a gritty, modern war film, this is it. You don't see too many films covering our more recent military exploits, unlike World War II or the Vietnam War. Now, I'm not going to go into the historicity of the film. There are a number of differences, but it's not as egregious as a lot of the "based on a true story" films out there. It features a lot of familiar faces who were up-and-comers at the time this came out. The action is visceral and you'll be hard-pressed not to hate the bloody Skinnies after watching it. (Unsurprisingly, Somalis aren't a big fan of this movie.) This may be part of the reason Ridley Scott went to bat for the other team in Kingdom of Heaven. Anyway, it's rather good at what it does and it's one of the few movies from Scott since the turn of the century that I actually like. Give this one a watch (unless you're a Somali, maybe).

Rating:
Watch It