BEHIND ENEMY LINES (2001) ** Owen Wilson can play dramatic roles too, even though they can't help starting out with a couple jokes. John Moore's disjointed cinematography conveys the adrenalin of battle very effectively, the sweeping aerial shots are spectacular and the sets are absolutely perfect: yep, that's what Bosnia looks like in my mind. The use of symbols; religious icons and a fractured hammer and sickle, are also used to good effect. What's the problem then? While the best moments make strange situations real, the worst make ridiculous situations mandatory. There's the one where he's running away from Serbian butchers, by taking off his balaclava in the middle of town and putting his blond head down and running as fast as he can. Then there's the one where he's being pursued by the Serbian assassin/sniper (armed with three guns) and they begin shooting at each other at about 100 feet and slowly approach one another until it ends up in a fistfight with Wilson blowing him up by putting a flare in his gut (that's not a spoiler, that's a warning; the climactic scene may be the best time to go make popcorn). The Serbian extremists see two parachutists come down, but they're satisfied that they've found everyone after finding one guy? There's a scene where Owen runs across cracking ice, but when, minutes later, hundreds of troops and several tanks come across the same ice it doesn't break....of, so maybe they could have used an editor. Gene Hackman isn't awful, I can still say I've never seen a bad Gene Hackman movie, but he doesn't seem particularly interested, somewhat out of it, maybe that's how he thinks military brass are. Full of insights on postmodern warfare, the reality of our "defenseful peacemakers" is staggering. Even better, though not as spectacular, is the portrayal of how the United States is perceived. The only character with any respect at all is a long-haired teenager (Kamil Kollarik) in an Ice-Cube t-shirt: he admires a musician threatened with incarceration for most of his adult life and thinks that's America. Maybe it is. Let it out! Behind enemy lines, indeed.
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