SwiftVets.com

[coldwarvet]

March 3, 2002

Boycott Mel Gibson's "We Were Soldiers"
By Paul Cox

Kenneth Turan's review of 'We Were Soldiers' on March 1, had the courage to pan the film as simple-minded and devoid of historical context. He was right on both counts, but I must add the movie also lies massively about the historical event itself. The book on which this stinker of a movie was based, 'We Were Soldiers Once...And Young', was written by one of the battalion commanders, and a journalist who was on hand for most of the LZ X-Ray battle. While the book itself was simple minded and devoid of historical context, it is, at least, brutally clear on what went down.

The movie, on the other hand, completely changes the end of the story. In the movie, after Mel (The Patriot) Gibson and his men of the First Battalion/Seventh Cavalry (1/7) kill all the North Vietnamese in the neighborhood, they left the field of battle as battered but victorious heroes, leaving nothing behind but a pile of dead Vietnamese. In reality, 1/7 was relieved by a column of troops from Second Battalion/Seventh Cavalry (2/7), who two days later were decimated in an intense ambush while moving to LZ Albany. The official count of American casualties from 1/7 was 49 dead and 124 wounded, and from 2/7 was 155 dead and 123 wounded. Thus, the movie has the temerity to end on a victorious note after only one quarter of the American fatalities had been inflicted.

Why did they do this? Randall (Pearl Harbor) Wallace--producer, director and screen writer--could have easily ended the movie as he began it. The movie began with a short segment of a deadly ambush on a French column in the same valley ten years earlier; it should have ended with at least a passing reference to the dying that happened after Mel Gibson's character left the battlefield. The audience would have perhaps left the theater with a much different taste in their mouths, and a much more accurate understanding of the historical truth. However, apparently Mr. Wallace was more interested in a little flag waving, and wanted to send the audience home with a patriotic buzz.

This film should have been named 'Big Fat Liar', but I understand that name has already been taken.

Paul Cox served in Vietnam from 1969-1970 as a USMC grunt. He is a member of Veterans for Peace, Chapter 69 San Francisco, CA.
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[Tony]

I respectfully disagree with Mr. Cox and am unclear as to what his objective is/was. I read the book first and then saw the movie. As is no surprise, the book is better and more detailed and of course there would be no way to make a movie that includes every part of what was a very long and detailed book. The fact that the movie only depicts one of the major battles that occurred and not the entire sequence of events is unimportant and certainly no reason to boycott the movie.

What is important about this particular movie, is that it allows people of my generation (that would be the generation often referred to as "generation X") to see a movie about Viet Nam that doesn't view the events there through the typical Hollywood stereotypes normally shown by the likes of Oliver Stone's "Platoon" or Stanley Kubrick's "Full Metal Jacket" (to name a few examples) which would have us believe that all the troops in Viet Nam did nothing more than smoke dope and shoot civilians. Movies are movies, of course, but knowing what I know of the military and those who serve in the military (through my own service), I know that the story told by Hal Moore and the film starring Mel Gibson are much more accurate depictions of the men who served in Viet Nam, who were after all, soldiers and conducted themselves as such.
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USN 1983-1992

[DougReese]

It seems that Mr. Cox has the same problem others had with the movie, although he focused on a different matter.

Hal Moore and Joe Galloway wrote the book, but were only personally involved in the first part of the battle, which was pretty much as shown in the movie (OK, they went a little overboard at the end, but remember, it's Hollywood!).

They made the decision to zero in on that portion of the battle, and not much else, other than a little character building, and introduction back in the USA. They didn't get into whether the war was right or wrong, or anything else -- just that battle.

Those who were there (Moore, Galloway and the troops) thought the movie was well done. I have heard them say it was about 75% real, and 25% Hollywood. That's damn good in this day and age.

No, the movie didn't try to be "all things about the war", but I view that as a good thing. What they did, they did well. Good for them.

Much of the movie was true -- even some of the little things, such as Mrs. Moore collapsing along the wall of her living room when a taxi pulled up to her house. The guy who said "Tell my wife I love her", really said that. The guy killed by napalm, and picked up by Galloway and another soldier, was true. So much of it was as it happened.

This movie was also more sympathetic to the enemy than any American war movie I've ever seen. This is probably due in large part to Moore and Galloway (and Jack Smith, Howard K. Smith's son) going to Vietnam to do a piece about the battle, and push the book, for ABC's 20-20. Jack Smith was a correspondent for ABC at the time (he died recently), and one of the soldiers involved in the second part of the battle. For those of you who aren't familiar with that episode, let me put it this way -- If you heard Jack Smith telling his story in a bar, you would bet your life savings that it was all BS, and that he was a phony. It is so unbelievable -- unbelievable, but totally true.

For that 20-20 piece they went out to the Ia Drang Valley along with the NVA officers they opposed in the actual battle. For those of you who have seen the movie, but weren't aware of that fact, it probably explains why there was such sympathy towards the North Vietnamese soldiers, beginning with the first words spoken in the movie.

I think Mr. Cox is simple minded, and full of himself. Furthermore, the movie does not "lie massively" about the historical event. Quite the opposite. If you haven't seen the movie, ignore this twit and get the DVD or video.

Doug