Lone Survivor - The Best Based-on-a-True-Story Movie I've Seen

     Movies based on true stories are among my favorites. It takes a lot for me to actually get emotionally involved in a movie, but when the stories are true, I realize that it could happen to anyone. It could happen to someone I know. It could happen to me. Lone Survivor is one of the best based-on-a-true-story movies I've seen in a very long time.
     The movie opened with a montage of a real, or seemingly real, training camp for the U.S. Navy. Trainees were pushing through training exercises and tests, getting screamed at, bonding, helping one another, struggling, succeeding, and completing the rigorous training with beaming smiles on their faces. The bond the forms between training marines is unlike any other. They are brothers. They're all each other has during training and when deployed. They need to love each other and protect each other at all costs, and that takes a type of love many of us don't experience. Opening with this montage grabbed my attention and reminded me and all of the audience members that this story is true and it happened to an average American Marine, not Mark Wahlberg or any other Hollywood actor. I think that was the best decision the creative team made when making this movie, because after that, the rest of the movie seems so real and you're emotionally involved in a different way than you would be if it opened with an A-list Hollywood actor like Mark Wahlberg, who portrays Petty Officer First Class Marcus Luttrell, the man whose experience in Afghanistan this story is based on.
     About halfway through the movie, I admit I felt a hint of boredom. I began wondering if the entire movie was going to be one long gunfight. It seemed to go on for a while, though it was moving along and changing scenery. The action was not boring, but I wondered if anything would change or something new would happen. I wondered why they would base a movie on only a lengthy and somewhat interesting gunfight.
     That boredom vanished almost immediately when something wildly unexpected happened between Luttrell and some Arab men who were not involved in the Taliban. Without spoiling the major turn of events of the story, what happens is beyond my imagination and it touches my heart in a way I wouldn't have expected. I understood what the story was about now, and I was even more obsessed.
     At the end of the movie they brought it back to real life by showing you pictures of every soldier you met during the movie and explained their rank, their families, or their lives or their families' lives after the military. It was important for the creators of this movie to remind the audience that this was not about Hollywood and cinema, it was about America and real-life Marines. It creates an emotional attachment to the movie that would otherwise not be there, and it's what makes this movie amazing.

Homeland.. Finally!

This week I finally started the television series Homeland. My friends have been after me, often telling me that this is one of the best shows on TV. Being a TV-R student I figured I had to see what all the talk was about.

Homeland, which was created by Gideon Raff and runs on Showtime, quickly draws you in with a compelling plot line. The first episode has many clips of main character Nicholas Brody, a Marine Sargent, held captive by al-Qaeda. After being imprisoned for eight years he is finally rescued by an American Delta Force raid. However, after so many years as a prisoner his life had been completely altered. As he returns home almost everything has changed with his family, and peoples perception of him. He is now a hero to the American people. His family, who assumed he was dead, now has the chance to build a relationship with their father/husband. However, the most interesting plot line is CIA agent Carrie Mathison, who has her own feelings about Brody. She has suspicion that Brody is coming to America as a possible terrorist threat and launches an investigation. The show creators have kept me guessing weather Brody is a hero or a terrorist. I am completely intrigued and will continue to watch more of this series in the upcoming weeks. I am officially hooked on my new show.

Shooter Review

I watched the movie Shooter tonight, starring Mark Wahlberg, and like all movies I watch now-a-days, I can't help but analyze the crap out of them.  This movie was no acception. It is an action movie so you're going to get a ton of your cliche gun battles, walking away from fiery explosions, to good to be true combat moves and techniques, among many other things.  The basic premise of the movie if you haven't seen it is Mark Wahlberg's character plays an ex marine sniper who gets commissioned by the Government to track down and thwart a potential assassination attempt.  Without his knowledge, his acceptance to help is a death sentence and they end up framing him for the killing of a head of state in some god for saken african country instead of the President of the United States to cover up some greedy crap.  Long story short, Mark Wahlbergs character out runs them all, out smarts them, and kills them all, and manages to escape a free man and clear his name.

I know what you're thinking, "that sounds awful and super cliche" and it totally is cliche, but my god it is good.  Mark Wahlberg first and foremost is an incredible actor.  I have loved him in every movie I've seen him in, he always fits the character he is meant to play extremely well.  His acting is one of the major highlights of the film.

From a directing standpoint, the director does a fantastic job of creating suspense (kind of like we watched in The Fast and the Furious).  Everything from music, body language, to editing, slowing time down, all of the landmark things you expect, he does to a tee, but, he also does some other things that knock it out of the park.

The story is quite good to begin with.  Sure, it is cliche, but even though I've seen it before, I'm on the edge of my seat the entire time because you just don't know what is going to happen next or what badass thing Mark Wahlberg is going to do to the enemy.

I also enjoyed how the enemies in the movie are very well defined but are not your average movie enemies.  One is a senator, one is a high ranking military official, and others hold offices in different branches of government.  I personally love conspiracies and do think the government has a lot more power and does a lot of things behind our back that we will never know about or choose to ignore.  This movie does an awesome job of showing you how easily the government can sway a country to think one thing when it couldn't be further from the truth.  The movie does a great job of asking the question we all fear the most, "Can one trust the government that they choose to give power too?"

Overall, after watching shooter tonight, it has become one of my favorite action movies.  It also got a 4 and a half star rating on Netflix which is pretty good in my opinion. I highly recommend it if you haven't seen it and are looking for a good action movie to watch.

Tyler Chadwick