From acclaimed director Kimberly Peirce (Boys Don’t Cry), Stop-Loss is a harrowing drama about the tolls of the Iraq war on the guys fighting it and the struggles they encounter in coming home.  Stop-Loss was released earlier this year to some mixed buzz and was pretty much dead in the water at the box office (pulling in less than $11 million on a budget of over $25 million).  As is the case with almost all the Iraq war dramas that have come out in the past year, the film didn’t draw anyone into the theaters so it’s looking for a second life on DVD.

Stop-Loss is about a group of soldiers from Texas deployed in Iraq who, after a horrible ambush in which most of their fellow soldiers were killed or maimed, come back home and experience many different kinds of troubles with the government they fought for, the citizens they laid their lives out for, their fellow soldiers, and (worst of all) within themselves. 

The squad leader Staff Sgt. Brandon King (Ryan Phillippe), who is struggling with how he led his guys into that ambush, comes home as a hero but soon learns he is a victim of the government’s horrible stop-loss policy.  Even though his tour is over and he is out of the Army he learns that he has to go back.  Unable to deal with that reality, Brandon hastily decides to go on the run.

His best friend Sgt. Steve Shriver (Channing Tatum), whose life was saved by Brandon in the ambush, is also struggling hard with coming back (boozing and hitting his fiancée) but he regains his purpose in life by volunteering for a sniper assignment.  This sends his fiancée Michelle (Abbie Cornish) off the edge, she just wants to get married and have him home.

She decides to help Brandon out by driving him to Washington D.C. where Brandon wants to meet with a Senator who greeted him when they arrived back in the States hoping the Senator can help him avoid going back to Iraq.  Steve is angry with Brandon for acting cowardly and tries to get him to come back before it is too late.         

CRITIQUE

Stop-Loss is a mixed bag that starts off extremely well but loses its focus towards the end with too much melodrama, too many visual tricks, too many stereotypical secondary characters, and too much message.  The beginning of the film with the soldiers in Iraq and the ambush sequence are expertly done and when the boys first come back to the States the story holds you in its grip but the last third is a big buzz-kill.  Even still, it is definitely worth a rental as the message is an important one, the acting is terrific and the first half of it is terrific.

Kimberly Peirce hasn’t done any films in a long time, not since her big debut with Boys Don’t Cry, and she certainly has incredible talent.  She just loses the focus on this one after the halfway point and it simply peters out.  Hopefully it doesn’t take another decade for her to make another film.

Peirce uses an interesting technique by showing most of the Iraq footage through the soldiers own home videos and it works perfectly in the beginning.  She mixes it in with the ambush sequence which she mostly shot with a handheld from the soldiers’ point of view and it is a mesmerizing sequence.  But I think it was a mistake to continue with those Iraq flashbacks using that same home video style technique.  It eventually becomes a distraction from the key story with Brandon, Steve and Michelle. 

Most of the secondary characters also become a distraction from the central story and seem to only serve as stereotypical stock characters just to add more storyline and preach “the message”.  This would have been a much better film if right around the time where Brandon goes on the run, the story and action only stays with him and his struggles.  And the Brandon, Steve and Michelle triangle is the only true story in that last half.  And the other mistake was to load too much message in that last half.

It is best to just let the story speak for itself and let the viewers feel the message you’re trying to convey rather than ramming it down your throat.  Because even though I agree whole-heartedly with the message, Stop-Loss feels overbearing in the end (unlike the brilliantly subtle In the Valley of Elah, which is somewhat similar and a thousand times better).

The lead acting here is terrific though.  Ryan Phillippe seems to be getting better and better through the last few years and this is one of his best, fully realized performances.  He nails the accent, mannerisms and bravado of a Texas soldier while infusing the character with warmth, intelligence and (most importantly) guilt. 

That delicate mix is the only reason that this story doesn’t fold right on top of itself once they arrive back in the States.  You have to believe that Brandon is a brave and honorable soldier that has the ability to lead and motivate men and that he justly feels wronged by his country and is having a devastating moral conflict inside about it.  With another actor in the role the character could seem like a cowardly whiner.

But Phillippe creates an empathetic character that you root for and hope that things work out in his favor.  Channing Tatum, who I never thought had the ability to do so, turns in a very strong supporting turn as Steve.  He makes Steve a much more complex and interesting guy than how it was written.  Tatum has a strong presence and he smartly plays most of his scenes in a subtle, down way which works beautifully for this role.  He might actually turn out to be a pretty damn good actor which is shocking after some of those god awful dance films.

The supporting cast is filled with good actors given some crappy material and stereotypical roles.  Abbie Cornish has a thankless role in which she basically has to act tough and Texas through every little last thing that happens and at one point during a fight with Brandon and some gangsters in a street alley her reaction induced a “oh, come on!”.

Joseph Gordon-Levitt, who has proven that he is a very entertaining and inventive actor, is also given a thankless role as the typical alcoholic soldier who can’t deal with coming back.  He’s not miscast; it’s just a very poorly written character.  And Timothy Olyphant, who can do no wrong because of his Deadwood days with me, is given a bunch of clichéd lines as the soldiers’ Lt. Colonel.  The rest of the cast has throwaway lines and barely makes a dent.

THE VIDEO

The transfer in 1.85:1 looks great when the film isn’t cutting back to the flashback footage or using those soldiers’ home video clips (which are obviously grainy and rough looking).  The colors are natural and everything looked sharp, I didn’t notice any clarity issues or any unintended grain.  

THE AUDIO

Stop-Loss is presented in Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround Sound and the presentation is exceptional.  This is a spot-on audio presentation that sounds amazing during that opening battle sequence and is crystal clear throughout the dialogue-heavy middle section.  The surround is perfectly balanced and detailed, and the subwoofer gets a workout in that opening scene.

THE EXTRAS

First off, there is a very informative and interesting Audio Commentary Track with director Kimberly Peirce and co-writer Mark Jacobs in which they go through just about every aspect of what went into making the film, why they made it and what they thought of the end result.  This is a very serious, detailed and informative track that isn’t exactly entertaining but I enjoyed listening to Peirce as she gets into all the different aspects of making a film like this.

Then there are two featurettes including The Making of Stop-Loss which is your standard twenty minute making-of doc with not a lot of substance (I say skip this and listen to the audio commentary) and A Day in Boot Camp which is an entertaining look at what the actors went through to become realistic soldiers.

There are also a handful of Deleted Scenes with optional commentary from Peirce.

FINAL THOUGHTS

Stop-Loss is a mixed bag filled with good intentions.  The film starts off brilliantly and keeps humming along until the halfway point where it begins to fall completely apart with the director using too many visual tricks, infusing too much message, using secondary characters as distracting stereotypes and losing focus on the central characters.  The DVD has a good transfer and outstanding audio and the extras are adequate.