Black Hawk Down (2001)
Where’s the rescue squad? We’re it!
THE SUMMARY: Army Rangers and Delta Force raid Mogadishu to capture a Somalian warlord and his men who have been seizing international food aid and slaughtering civilians, but when air support is shot down, the mission flips from capture to rescue as US forces take unexpectedly heavy resistance and casualties. I admittedly have a personal bias in this movie’s favor - it was one of my brother’s favorites, and so it’s one of mine too. But it’s not just a personal emotional connection that earns my high praise. This movie is among the best in both its visual and philosophical depictions of modern warfare.
FROM MOVIE-PICKER MATT P: Great modern war movie. Visually great movie with a good cast.
THE BEST:
Its visual depiction of war: It’s gritty. It’s graphic. It’s tragic. And despite portraying civil war Mogadishu, it’s visually beautiful too. Not just in the chaos of the urban battle, but in the subtleties of several shots. The shot of Grimes’ eye when he gets his ‘bell rung’ and buried by debris (I tried to find it on YouTube but couldn’t), the tension of the helicopter crashes, the exhaustion of the ‘Mogadishu mile’ to close - just a few of my favorite scenes. It’s a thoughtful and artistic presentation of a chaotic mess.
Combat scenes of Black Hawk Down
The Mogadishu mile
Its philosophical depiction of war: Even more than the visuals though, I appreciate the philosophy of war this movie prompts you to think about. Is this movie ‘pro-war?’ Is it ‘anti-war?’ You can make an argument for both, and there are characters who do. Eversmann believes throughout that the US intervention is a force for good, even if it is in some faraway godforsaken country, and that the sacrifices of his men mean something: ‘Nobody asks to be a hero, it just sometimes turns out that way.’ Hoot, in contrast, accepts and speaks to the pointlessness and meaninglessness of it all: ‘See you're thinking. Don't. 'Cause Sergeant, you can't control who gets hit or who doesn't or who falls out of a chopper or why. It ain't up to you. It's just war.’
And is it a happy or a sad ending? Or both? One one hand, the mission accomplishes little - Aidid remained in power, Somalia remained a shithole country, and the US gained nothing more than Ilhan Omar in Congress. Mogadishu destroyed itself on CNN anyway, as Eversmann warned it could, regardless of US boots there or not. On the other hand, even Hoot’s less idealistic perspective recognizes it’s not about the politics when the bullets start flying. It’s about the man next to you. And there’s beauty and valor in that quest for survival, even if the quest itself is unjustified or unnecessary.
What I love about this movie is it’s both - it’s pro- and anti-war simultaneously, and neither uniquely. The truth is war is always a mess of contradictions - it can be both necessary and wasteful. War is often the heroics of brave men acting upon the command of cowards. And there can be very meaningful victories in the context of defeat, and vice versa.
This movie is about admiring the courage and sacrifice of the grunt, while hating the incompetence and selfishness of the command, a truth that holds in nearly all armed conflicts.
Why are you going to fight somebody else’s war?
Once that first bullet goes past your head…
The real soldiers of the war: The movie is a largely accurate depiction of the events and the people involved, at least according to the book on which it is based, Black Hawk Down: a Story of Modern War. As that book demonstrates, several chapters could be written about the actions of the men that day, but Delta Force snipers Randy Shughart and Gary Gordon are the two legends I will always remember. It’s admirable enough to enter a combat zone knowing things could get bad. It’s another level to voluntarily drop into a crash site with hundreds of AK-armed Somali militia sprinting at you from all sides. They did it, and they fought as hard as hard as any man conceivably could. I can’t imagine hell itself has fates much worse than how they died. Reports say they took out at least 25 Somalis before they did.
As the movie notes to close, their Medals of Honor were the first awarded since Vietnam. On another historical note, Randy Shughart’s dad Herbert refused to shake President Clinton’s hand at the award ceremony and ripped him instead, saying ‘you are not fit to be president of the United States. The blame for my son's death rests with the White House and with you. You are not fit to command.’ Based. Of course Bubba Bill would prove him definitively correct just a few years later.
A movie that made its cast: Hey look, it’s Obi-Wan Kenobi! Hey look, it’s Legolas! Hey look, it’s Jaime Lannister! Okay, Ewan McGregor technically played Obi-Wan before Grimes, but still - it’s cool to see younger versions of actors who went on to become household names after this one. Without this movie, it’s possible major characters we’ve all loved are played by somebody entirely different.
THE WORST:
The pilot’s story is closed by a footnote: It’s a bit disappointing that the surviving pilot who is captured by the militia is not given a proper ending within the movie, other than some brief text noting he was released from Somali custody 11 days later. It does seem the release was somewhat uneventful - Aidid just dropped him off with the Red Cross - but still, a proper closure for that character would have been nice.
His scenes are one of many reasons I will always love the MP5. Nothing handier when you have broken legs in Mogadishu!
THE RATING: 5/5 Wicky no-doubter. Full disclosure: I had already decided that rating before even watching it again. I hadn’t seen this one for about ten years, but I enjoy it as much today as I did then.
YOUR RATING: Vote here ⬇
NEXT WEEK: Galaxy Quest (1999)
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