RULES OF ENGAGEMENT (2000)

The other month I wrote about William Friedkin's RULES OF ENGAGEMENT over on the GUY.com LAST MOVIE WATCHED? thread, and thought I'd share those thoughts here with the movie hounds at CHUD. I wrote this after having seen the film for the first time in many years:

 

I remember that the last time I saw this film, back in the year 2000, I was on SAMUEL L JACKSON's side. I don't remember why, I guess I was just dumb and young and so I felt happy when he was acquitted of murder at the end of the movie (SPOILERS). After all, that's clearly what the film tells us we should be feeling (what with the heroic theme music piping in as the verdict is read)

When I rewatched it, I couldn't help but feel that a great injustice had been done when Jackson gets off scott free

I went and did some research to see how the film was initially received back in the day, and what I found was curious. It was called "outright racist" by the BOSTON GLOBE, and the ARAB DEFAMATION LEAGUE called it the most racist film Hollywood ever made

Watching it now, in 2011, I am not sure I'd call it racist. Fascist might well be a better word

IMHO, ROE seems to offer up an accurate and even handed depiction of protests in the Arab world. After all, just the other month we saw four UN workers burned to death because some red neck in Florida torched a Koran. We've all had quite an education in violent, radical Islam since the movie came out and so I can't say that it seems that outlandish - the scenario depicted in the movie -  which centers around a protest in Yemen outside the American embassy

What boggles my mind though is the fact that we're expected to cheer and root for characters who are doing their best to defend the monstrous actions of Samuel L Jackson's Col. Childers character. It's all right there in the opening 15 minutes of the film. Rather than first target rooftop snipers, or fire warning shots to disperse civilians, he orders his troops to open fire the crowd. "Waste the mother fuckers!" he shouts, seconds after being informed that there was no clear line of fire for armed targets in the crowd, given that women and children were amongst the protesters

The movie seems to want the debate to hinge on the presence of weapons in the crowd, and whether or not the crowd was in fact unarmed. Tommy Lee Jones endeavors to prove some in the mob were shooting, and the powers that be seek to cover that fact up. However, that question is totally beside the point. As Guy Pearce makes clear: rather than attempt to first fire warning shots or kill the snipers (which could have caused civilians to flee), Jackson immediately orders his troops to "waste" the protesters, knowing full well that there were women and children in the crowd

According to the movie, Pearce's reasoning is faulty, Jackson did the right thing, and the forces of the military justice system that seek to convict him for his actions are corrupt and wrong headed

Yikes.. Kind of amazing how a decade's time can put the entire plot of a film in a radically different perspective

 

 

I will respond to Johnny Daywakjer's post tomorrow (on my iPad right now), but i just wanted to state that is simply not what happened. The marines were all pinned down by fire. Some from the crowd, and then some marines had been killed by rooftop snipers. Until that moment, the marines had been totally non aggressive, hiding rather than firing back

I understand the threat to their lives, but there is no logic when Jackson jumps right to "blind fire into a crowd of women and children" as his next course of action. They had time to first target snipers on the roofs. He had time, cover and ammo to first just fire off a few rounds into the air, at least giving civilians who wanted to flee a fire fight the chance to do so. He gave no warning that he was about to respond with a show of force so deadly it would leave 80 men women and children dead

That is the problem. He disobeyed rules and regulations and skipped right to targeting civilians, when there were several No Risk alternatives at his disposal that might have prevented bloodshed

Please explain to me why he couldn't have ordered a marine to first fire off a few rounds into the air, signaling that the US TROOPS were about to begin return fire. The reason the civilians felt comfortable protesting in a crowd that included gun men is because the marines had, till the moment Jackson ordered a killing spree, given zero indication they intended to do anything other than sit there and endure it

All of a sudden they pop out and rain down death after 30 minutes of silence? That is not honorable conduct. Jackson may have had a mental break of some sort, but his conduct is still not excused by that fact

I respect what you have to say and you make some salient points about the film, but I still just get the feeling that the film is trying to say that his actions were simply a tough call during wartime, one that non soldiers couldn't understand. It's not just that he was under fire and acted to save the lives of his men in a way that happened to result in gruesome civilian casualties. It's that there were clearly better courses of action, that would have reduced risk both to his men (he had them exit cover to fire into the crowd while they were still being target by roof top snipers - snipers who could have been targeted first without risk of fire from the crowd. Jackson's men pointed this out to him, and he spits back in anger "waste the mother fuckers". Jackson's character suffered some sort of mental break, perhaps, and went crazy. In that situation it is understandable that could happen to someone with his life experience. However the movie never really made that point, and it essentially stuck to the explanation that it was a tough call the civies back home couldn't relate to

That's what bothers me. Guy Pearce lays it out: he could have done X-Y-Z, with better results and less risk. And yet the movie essentially says that while yes, Jackson is perhaps disturbed, Pearce is wrong about those basic facts

That was my take away, but I enjoyed hearing your views