MOVIE REVIEW

Rules of Engagement (2000)

Starring: Tommy Lee Jones, Samuel L. Jackson, Anne Archer, Ben Kingsley, Blair Underwood, Guy Pearce
Director: William Friedkin
Rating: R

Studio: Paramount

Review Posted: Unknown

Rating: 6/10

By Sheila Danzig

Rules of Engagement had troubles in production. James Webb, former Secretary of the Navy, who developed the story, insisted that his name be removed from the project because there was a scene, or scenes, that betrayed his version. Only after changes were made did Webb agree to keep his connection to the movie.

The first half hour of the movie, where we go back to the jungles of Viet Nam and meet lead character Terry L. Childers (Samuel L. Jackson) and see him shoot a prisoner-of-war in cold blood to save his own men, was excellent. It was a gripping battle scene that made me think, made me feel, and horrified me. It was a spectacular audio and video production that had me thinking I was on my way to seeing a "10".

We then move 28 years forward in time, and see that both Childers and Hodges are Colonels. Hodges, about to retire, and Childers on a routine mission to Yemen. The routine mission goes bad and Childers is faced with a court martial being charged with murder of 83 innocent citizens of Yemen. Childers asks Hodges, who became a lawyer after returning from Viet Nam, to defend him.

This is where the movie becomes ordinary. It had the opportunity to explore the unanswerable question: "When does killing in combat become murder?" Instead we get a run of the mill courtroom thriller, that did not thrill me. It was contrived, unrealistic, had holes in the plot and lost an opportunity to examine the morality of what it is really like to make decisions while in combat. It surprised me to see a trial that had no surprises. I also had a problem with the poor defense that was presented by Hodges. A key piece of evidence had mysteriously disappeared. It doesn’t take a lawyer to find out who signed for it when it was delivered to the State Department. Instead Hodges talks about it, shouts about it, but never determines what actually happened to it. This was something that would have been so easily done, and I was so annoyed that he failed to do it.

The ending fell flat. I left feeling unsatisfied. There was an epilogue telling us what happened afterwards. I found this to be confusing since I have never seen an epilogue in anything other than a true story. I thought, because of that use of an epilogue, that perhaps it was based on a true story. It was not, and viewers may be as confused as I was. It left me feeling as if they used up all of the allotted time to tell as much of the story as they could and then added another ending to resolve some issues.

I was unsatisfied when I left the theater. But I was entertained, and it was worth seeing, though you won’t miss much if you wait till it is on cable or you can rent it.