Black Hawk Down

[The Feral Underclass]

Although it was clearly pro american the actual production values on this film are incredible...

I cant stop watching it...Not only do you get a sense of the charactors and a bonding with them the exccitment is so real.

The photography on this film is like nothing that has been done before. To try and catch the audience and create that sense of realism scott uses documentry style shooting mixed with precision shots that he designs to draw you in. he uses 35mm film like van gogh uses canvus. He is an artist and pure genius. It is so raw and in your face directing. The shots of the landscape take your breath away. It is a fantastic piece of production being able to balance the light and catch the right shot while buzzing around in a helicopter.

The location is supurb, the action sequences are believable and consistent, the acting is real and the special effects are beautifully crafted.

AN AMAZING FILM AND I LOVE IT!!!

Anyone else like to comment...so long as you dont say anything bad :P

[truthaddict11]

i fell asleep in the theater while watching it

[Se7en]

i watched it on my flight to austria two summers ago...i wasn't all that impressed.

[Comité De Salut Public]

Originally posted by The Anarchist [email protected] 13 2003, 09:43 PM
Although it was clearly pro american the actual production values on this film are incredible...

I cant stop watching it...Not only do you get a sense of the charactors and a bonding with them the exccitment is so real.

The photography on this film is like nothing that has been done before. To try and catch the audience and create that sense of realism scott uses documentry style shooting mixed with precision shots that he designs to draw you in. he uses 35mm film like van gogh uses canvus. He is an artist and pure genius. It is so raw and in your face directing. The shots of the landscape take your breath away. It is a fantastic piece of production being able to balance the light and catch the right shot while buzzing around in a helicopter.

The location is supurb, the action sequences are believable and consistent, the acting is real and the special effects are beautifully crafted.

AN AMAZING FILM AND I LOVE IT!!!

Anyone else like to comment...so long as you dont say anything bad :P
I agree that the movie is very exciting from the point of view of a movie-goer that likes fast-paced action once in a while. But U.S. involvement in the strategic Horn of Africa where Somalia is situated is enough for one to dismiss the rhetoric of the movie--- that the U.S. is so good it is willing to sacrifice its troops for the greater good of Somalia. Now they have a videogame called Conflict: Desert Storm II- Back to Baghdad

When will the propaganda end?

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detai...ogames&n=468642 (http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/B0000A03AI/qid=1071354808/sr=1-1/ref=sr_1_1_etk-vg/104-3337501-1867165?v=glance&s=videogames&n=468642)

[Saint-Just]

When this film came out there was lots of talk about the film being funded by the American government, so it is not surpising it has high production values. I don't think I could enjoy it that much even if it is so well put together because of the propaganda experience in it.

[(*]

good action, tense, exciting. Special effects were really good as well, nice cinematography.

the pro-americanism etc was a little hard to swallow, but it wasn't all that bad.

[Urban Rubble]

I love this movie, alot of people say it's horrible.

This movie is not propaganda, it's pretty much 100% factual. Show me one thing that was false.

[SonofRage]

I fell asleep while trying to watch it.

[Comité De Salut Public]

Originally posted by Urban [email protected] 14 2003, 12:44 AM
I love this movie, alot of people say it's horrible.

This movie is not propaganda, it's pretty much 100% factual. Show me one thing that was false.
It was factual in the day to day battle scenes but in the motivation to go into Somalia it was all wrong. If the U.S. cared so much about Africa why did it let hundreds of thousands of Rwandans die a couple of years earlier during the genocide? Fuck that movie. I sold the copy of the movie that I had for cheap just because I didn't want to be thought of as a right-wing nut. Also how about We Were Soldiers. with Mel Gibson. What a bunch of crock! That movie portrayed the U.S. as a well-meaning nation. A bunch of ignorami were in that movie. Oh fuck why do I bother?

[Jimmie Higgins]

On of the actors in the movie is an activist:

http://www.salon.com/ent/movies/feature/20...2/03/12/sexton/ (http://www.salon.com/ent/movies/feature/2002/03/12/sexton/)

Follow this link for an article about it... on a side note, oh how I love when liberal yuppies condesend to revolutionaries :blink:. Really Salon.com entertainment reporter, make fun of activists (who are actually trying to do something) from your golden perch where you do the really socially important work of commenting on movies on a trendy liberal website.

[Urban Rubble]

That Mel Gibson movie was bullshit, but I found Black Hawk Down pretty accurate.

[Comrade Beria]

I laughed without remorse when the western capitalist imperlialist pigs were wounded and killed. Who is the crusader cowboy Clinton to enforce opiated Western moral values on the anarchist utopia of Somalia?

[Chewillneverdie]

anarchist utopia?? I've read the book numorous times. Its unbiased also, alot like the movie. Aiedid(?) was killing people rushing to get food so he could blame it on the UN. If you have seen the movie you also notice they are very strict at killing innocents (lol yeah i know it is the US) the local militias were shooting from behind women and children, to keep the US soldiers from firing at them. Flashbang got em away fast tho. Yeah killing people trying to get food is a real fucking utopia...

[The Feral Underclass]

Scott is actually British, and as for the US government funding the film it maybe true. The questions of africa are also valid. Clinton did not care about Africa. His motives in Somalia are not so clear.

However, it is a film. A film is not real life, no matter how much the film is based on facts. Some films are merely pieces of entertainment and should be viewed as such. Others, like Black hawk Down, are pieces of art. The film should be watched based on that. if a revolution happened tomorrow it would not be so different for us and the comradery and anti-war sentiments were spot on. Not only that but the photography was a precedenat..Look how clean and gritty it is...it's amazing...

people should get over yourselves...you dont buy the bullshit so enjoy the movie for the painting that it is.

[(*]

I enjoyed the movie, but it wasn't art! (IMO of course :P )

Art for me (movies)...
Braveheart
Brotherhood of the Wolf
Batman
The Matrix

Bunch of Disney animations movies
Princess mononoke
Grave of the Fireflies
Spirited away


I could go on forever...

[@[email protected]@]

Perhaps, we should initiate a movement: Let the American soldiers go home crosses the Christmas day?

[suffianr]

This movie is not propaganda, it's pretty much 100% factual. Show me one thing that was false.

The APCs that rescued the Rangers weren't driven by Pakistanis with bad English, rather, it was Malaysian armour (6x6 Condors, if I'm not mistaken) that saved the Americans at the Bukharra Market. Total blackout; there's no mention of it in the film.

Some of our guys died saving your guys too, y'know?

[The Feral Underclass]

batman? braveheart? art? philistine!!!

[(*]

au contraire, I consider myself an expert on movies! :P

Batman was art because of the music, the "dark quality" etc...)
Braveheart was art becaue of the scenery and story.

[canikickit]

One man's art is another man's Mona Lisa.

[suffianr]

Yeah, Braveheart scored loads of points for it's cinematography. If I hadn't already been to Scotland, I'd really want to go there. :)

[Inti]

I liked BHD as well.. Was lots of action, but sadly as often in hollywood productions it was too damn patriotic for me.. Almost never see the swedish flag swaying when I watch swedish movies.. but too often the american flag in those HW pictures.. Not to say I dont like hollywood movies.. I love movies.. Just get annoyed at times..

I really liked Kill Bill a lot
Lord of the Rings ( Im a tolkien fan )
The two towers ( Im a tolkien fan )
braveheart (yeah, me too)
Amores Perros (rough but cool)
Django ( a movie from peru about the most famous criminal in peru that never ever killed a person even though he was a bank robber )
and many more

[(*]

yeah, I'd consider kill bill art as well.

I really never got into the whole lord of the rings thing.

[Sabocat]

Originally posted by (*@Dec 14 2003, 12:33 PM
I enjoyed the movie, but it wasn't art! (IMO of course :P )

Art for me (movies)...
Braveheart
Brotherhood of the Wolf
Batman
The Matrix

Bunch of Disney animations movies
Princess mononoke
Grave of the Fireflies
Spirited away


I could go on forever...
Brotherhood of the Wolf was art because Monica Bellucci was in it.... :P

[Chewillneverdie]

BHD displayed the bonding of soldiers under fire. Im not sure how many Somalians were fightin the Spec Ops. Wasnt it like a 10 to 1 ratio though? All i know is, if the shit is hittin the fan with some big terrorist, happy the Delta Force could save my ass. Tho who knows, im not gonna turn terrorist tho, but they might come after me lol

[Chewillneverdie]

BHD displayed the bonding of soldiers under fire. Im not sure how many Somalians were fightin the Spec Ops. Wasnt it like a 10 to 1 ratio though? All i know is, if the shit is hittin the fan with some big terrorist, happy the Delta Force could save my ass. Tho who knows, im not gonna turn terrorist tho, but they might come after me lol

[Pedro Alonso Lopez]

Black Hawk Down was an extremely boring piece of cinema.

Good films

Clockwork Orange especially its aesthethization of violence.

The Warriors for its portrayal of fear and paranoia

The Third Man - film noir thats why

Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas - for its apt portrayal of the effects of various drugs.

[Urban Rubble]

Black Hawk Down was an extremely boring piece of cinema.

Please tell me you're not one of those people who thinks that their opinion is "The way it is". It isn't. If I and some other people enjoyed the film then it wasn't boring. It may have been boring to you, but are you really that arrogant to think that if you dislike something it "sucks" ? I hope not.

I hate reading Shakespeare, but I still realize the guy was a genius and a great writer.

[Jesus Christ]

Black Hawk Down was an amazing movie, but yea, they gave the wrong reasons for being over there
the US became involved for the conflict diamonds, anything to make a profit

[sin miedo]

Diamonds? I doubt it, if you can provide evidence mayber I'll believe it, but I think its more complicated than profiting from the Somalian diamond trade.

The Thin Red Line = Art
Citizen Kane = Art
Black Hawk Down = Exciting and fun movie

As for BHD being propaganda, yes, it doesn't get into all the reasons the U.S. actually sent troops, but that wasn't the point of the movie was it. Just because a movie doesn't shout the glories of socialism or expose some corrupt U.S. actions, doesn't mean ya'll need to walk around proclaiming its fascist bullshit. Try to lighten up a bit.

[Chewillneverdie]

how is this propaghanda? when does it say how great the US is, when does a flag wave? AND SOMEONE EXPLAIN WHAT THE US MOTIVES WERE AND WHY THEY WERE WRONG. I agree with taking out that warlord. He needed to be taken out. and the movie was about that battle, not about the US motives. All in all a great movie

[Hampton]

Unlike his earlier film G.I. Jane, Black Hawk Down received the full co-operation of the US military. The actors went through a period of intensive training at Fort Bragg and were, Scott proudly declared, “traumatised” by the time they arrived in Morocco for the start of filming.

To get that kind of co-operation Scott had to allow the military a veto over every aspect of the film. As a result, Black Hawk Down is not a genuine artistic exploration of the experience of US intervention in Somalia, but a blatant glorification of US militarism.

Scott does not seem to have had to compromise any artistic principles to achieve this result. Interviewed on BBC radio about Black Hawk Down, he repeatedly referred to the US army as a “militia”—as though America’s professional army, maintained with the highest level of military spending in the world, could be compared to the 18th century volunteers who fought for American independence, or the union army that defeated the breakaway by the southern slave-holding states in the 19th century.

Black Hawk Down: naked propaganda masquerading as entertainment (http://www.wsws.org/articles/2002/feb2002/hawk-f19.shtml)

Black Hawk -- and Truth -- Down (http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=12175)


December 18, 2001 -- The Army pressured the filmmakers of Black Hawk Down to change the name of the war hero portrayed by Ewan McGregor -- because the real-life soldier is serving a 30-year prison term for rape and child molestation, says the man who wrote the book that spawned the movie.

In Ridley Scott's highly anticipated movie, McGregor plays Ranger John Grimes, a desk jockey who is called into battle during the botched Army operation in Somalia in 1993.

The character is based on real-life Ranger John "Stebby" Stebbins, but Pentagon officials asked his name be changed in an attempt to keep his shame a secret, claims author Mark Bowden, who also penned the original screenplay for the movie.

Stebbins' embittered ex-wife, Nora Stebbins, complained in an e-mail to The Post: "They are going to make millions off this film in which my ex-husband is portrayed as an All-American hero when the truth is he is not."

War-Film `Hero' Is A Rapist (http://www.ratical.org/ratville/JFK/JohnJudge/linkscopy/BlkHawkDown.html)

Hollywood drags bloody corpse of truth across movie screens (http://www.ratical.org/ratville/JFK/JohnJudge/linkscopy/BHDchin.html)

Somalis give thumbs down to `Black Hawk' (http://www.ratical.org/ratville/JFK/JohnJudge/linkscopy/SomalisTDBHD.html)

[Chewillneverdie]

sigh, is everything a conspiracy to some people, cant you just enjoy a movie. Stebbins fought well for a desk jockey. So what if they changed his name. Did any of you read the book?

[Domino]

I hate Black Hawk Down.

The Thin Red Line is the best war movie so far.

[Chewillneverdie]

best war movie hmmmm....k apocolypse now, full metal jacket, hamburger hill, saving private ryan, and would you count B.O.B. as a movie?

[Urban Rubble]

I hated a Thin Red Line.

[Domino]

Originally posted by Urban [email protected] 22 2003, 07:36 PM
I hated a Thin Red Line.
Good for you.



Apocolypse now: Boring. I don't care what critics say.
Full metal jacket: Only the first part is good.
Hamburger hill: It's good, I agree.
Saving private Ryan: OK, but not the best.

You forgot Platoon, now there's another great movie.

[Chewillneverdie]

Apocolypse Now was just extremely great, demonstrated how long it took for a human to crack under pressure. Also had the greatest line out of any movie "fuck it, im getting me some mangos". Hamburger Hill was great, grandpa fought in the battle i love what he said about the battle "and thats when the little fucks got me, gdamn RPG hit a tree and blew shit into me, but i took so many of the little shits cause of my sniper rifle, and working the 60 i guess they diserved to shoot me" hes more pissed at the gov. than he is the Vietcong, which for me is very funny. Why didnt you like S.P.R. tete? it was very realistic and the acting was brilliant. Yeah platoon was awesome, fucking awesome.

[Domino]

Oh, I did Like Saving Private Ryan, I just said it isn't the best war movie, but I liked it. I tend to stay away from the typical claimed "Hollywood filmmakers", but Spielberg and Hanks together do wonders. Band Of Brothers, for example.

[Invader Zim]

It was Zulu for an American audiance, just it didn't have that edge of classic quality that Zulu did.

The film was shit, the only truly impressive thing was the camera work.

I'm sorry I wasted my time watching it, when I could have been watching some classic movie like Pulp Fiction or The Usual Suspects.

[Hate Is Art]

my favourite film lock stock and 2 smocking barrels or resevoir dogs, classy cool stuff

[campell999]

I borrowed "Black Hawk Down" from my mother because I really like Ewan McGregor. Sadly, I was very disappointed by this film, because it just seemed to be a bunch of American hype about how honorable and noble of a country we are for coming to the aid of other nations. Well, we don't care that much, we only let the military out when there is something to be gained from travelling overseas. I thought the cinematography was well done and yes some of the camera angles and lighting seemed to be very difficult to capture. I believe a better movie would be "Three Kings" because one of the Mark Wahlberg's character says they are there as soliders to help the people, then his captor pours oil down his throat shouting, "this is what you are here for." I beleive that represents why we send troops overseas, to protect our own financial gain and the movie, "Black Hawk Down" was trying to skew that.

[Urban Rubble]

I borrowed "Black Hawk Down" from my mother because I really like Ewan McGregor. Sadly, I was very disappointed by this film, because it just seemed to be a bunch of American hype about how honorable and noble of a country we are for coming to the aid of other nations. Well, we don't care that much, we only let the military out when there is something to be gained from travelling overseas. I thought the cinematography was well done and yes some of the camera angles and lighting seemed to be very difficult to capture. I believe a better movie would be "Three Kings" because one of the Mark Wahlberg's character says they are there as soliders to help the people, then his captor pours oil down his throat shouting, "this is what you are here for." I beleive that represents why we send troops overseas, to protect our own financial gain and the movie, "Black Hawk Down" was trying to skew that.

Do yourself a favor, try to not think in terms of politics when watching movies. Enjoy it or hate it because of it's qualities, not because you don't agree with the real life policies of the armies in the movies.

Three Kings ? That was a horrible movie (in my opinion).

[Chewillneverdie]

lol i agree with you rubble, BHD was accurate, and a good movie, just like some Nam movies, im against the sending of troops to horrid deaths. I stil love apocolypse now and Hamburger Hill, which was extremely realistic (H.H. anyway)

[birdfarm]

I try not to think about politics when I watch movies--but this one went too far. Would you be able to praise the cinematography of a movie that showed the Warsaw Ghetto uprising as a bunch of evil Jews--with exaggeratedly big hooked noses--killing beautiful noble Nazis, who just fought back in self-defense?
If you could, you don't belong on the Che list ("Dejame decirle...que un revolutionario verdadero es guidado para los grandes sentimentados de amor").

This film (like my hypothetical example above) is both racist and exactly backward. It shows Somalis shooting every white person they could see, but this only happened after US & European soldiers spent much of the day shooting hundreds of Somalis (some US officials say 1000)--many unarmed--from helicopters.

An excerpt from The Observer, a UK paper, regarding the worst atrocities (printed in a March 22, 1998, based on recent investigative journalism by Mark Bowden of the Phila. Inquirer):
"Ambassador Robert Oakley, the US special representative to Somalia, [said] that more than 1,000 Somalis were killed."
"[One of the Rangers] saw young boys, seven and eight-year-olds, some with weapons, some without. He shot them all. In one incident Rangers took a family hostage. When one of the women started screaming at the Americans she was shot dead. In another incident a Somali prisoner was allegedly shot dead when he refused to stop praying out loud. Another was clubbed into silence."


More facts behind Black Hawk Down:

(1) We were not there to provide humanitarian relief. We were there (a) to enforce the domination of the IMF "structural adjustment"--our pro-IMF puppet Siad Barre was getting unpopular & we had to go back him up and (b) to "pacify" the country so we could get on with the business of exploiting newly discovered oil.

(2) Aidid--the villain in the movie--was our ally for a while. We were betting on him to overthrow Barre, which he did, so we tried to get in good with him. But, Aidid turned against us after we accidentally blew up a meeting of all the elders of his clan, who were discussing whether to accept the terms of a UN peace treaty.

(3) Famine had peaked months earlier and things were getting better. There was no problem with the delivery of food aid and no need for troops. Losses were running at 5% to 10%--about average for food relief programs. However, after the military forces arrived, food aid was disrupted and preventable deaths escalated.

(4) The lack of central authority did not mean that Somalia was wracked with chaos. Government was in place and effective on a local level, and most of the country was peaceful (except for the areas the US was trying to subdue). Remember, much of the world survived with this type of local government, without being incorporated into empires or big nation states, for much of history. (I don't idealize local government, I just point out that it has existed effectively).

(5) In the movie, the Somalis seem like animals, attacking without obvious reason. In reality, it was quite reasonable for them to resist "intervention," since it was designed to subjugate the disparate local governments under a centralized dictator (who would bow to the IMF and US). Furthermore, the US/UN forces committed terrible atrocities while they were there. In one incident, UN Pakistani troops fired into an unarmed protest, killing hundreds. In other incidents of mistaken targeting, we blew up the offices of several NGOs. Overall, the US/UN killed over 10,000 people in a matter of weeks.

(6) In the specific incident that occurred, US helicopters came in to assassinate Aidid (our former ally gone astray--just like Hussein, bin Laden, Milosevic... hmmm...) People on the street were infuriated (after all, the US wasn't too happy when people from a foreign country tried to fly planes into our capital city to assassinate our leader). Many gathered to protest. Some began shooting at the helicopters, which returned fire into the massive mostly unarmed crowds. Hundreds of people were killed, some (including the UK paper The Observer) say as many as 1000. Eventually the helicopters were brought down & some US soldiers were killed, as in the movie--that part did happen. But the inexplicable animal-like behavior of the movie becomes more understandable when you learn that it was in response to massive brutality. Other countries, including Canada and Belgium, put their soldiers on trial for the "excesses" of that day. Of course, the US just pats 'em on the back.

(7) Just for good measure, the depiction of Somalis itself is COMPLETELY inaccurate--they were shown as very dark-skinned, stocky in build, roundish in face--these are characteristics common to central Africa, but Somalis tend to be much lighter-skinned, slender and taller, which makes sense since Somalia is right across the Red Sea from the Arabian Peninsula and trade/culture has mixed across the sea for milennia. Why exaggerate and distort these racial characteristics if not to play to Americans' basest racism?

More info (this isn't where I got my info, but here's some other stuff I found):
http://www.zmag.org/content/ForeignPolicy/...onblackhawk.cfm (http://www.zmag.org/content/ForeignPolicy/sextonblackhawk.cfm)
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/sept11info/message/3510

[Chewillneverdie]

hmmmmmmmm i smell bullshit. lol Aidid mowed down civies, bad thing to do. Alotta the time the US followed the R.O.E. read the fucking interviews by the people of Somalia and the soldiers.

[Agent provocateur]

If you've read Howard Zinn's A People's History of the United States (the latest edition which includes the 2000 U.S. election and the war on terrorism) you will find out that Zinn thinks the movie Black Hawk Down romanticized the U.S. military intervention in Somalia.

[Monty Cantsin]

its pretty boring i can't watch it all the way trough.

[Chewillneverdie]

the movie is about a battle lol. Everything that happened in the movie was very accurate

[suffianr]

Everything that happened in the movie was very accurate

I beg to differ.

The Rangers were saved by Malaysian troops, in Malaysian APCs, in a rescue mission that was jointly-organised and executed by Malaysian and American forces.

There was no mention of this in the movie.

Instead, you get is a rushed scene where with what you assume is a Pakistani driver, with a lousy accent, yelling at Ewan McGregor that he will only move when commanded to.

This is bullshit. The Pakistani Scorpion light armour pulled out during the Rescue Op because of the threat of handheld anti-tank fire from the Somalis.

And we lost a few men, too.

[Chewillneverdie]

well i was referring to the battle scene, they do a good job in the book though. The movie also failed to show the fact that the Somalis were firing from behind children, and in between the legs of women. I just find the battle fascinating, 100 men against over 1,000 right?

[suffianr]

Yeah, pretty much. Horrible odds. It was amazing that they lasted that long.

[Chewillneverdie]

i dig those 2 snipers, they were brave as hell. Hope they dont ever get involved in mexico,(Delta Force) i plan on going there and fighting with the EZLN. Arent they supposed to be the best commandos in the world? Although ive also heard the same about the Isreali commandos.