Movie Review: Lone Survivor

Starring: Mark Wahlberg, Taylor Kitsch, Emile Hirsch & Eric Bana

Director: Peter Berg
In a few words...: Hollywood treatment of the disastrous Operation Red Wings, a 2005 Navy SEAL mission into Afghanistan to capture notorious Taliban leader Ahmad Shah 
Rating: 10/10

Warning: Spoilers Ahead!!

 

I read the book a year ago, and at the time was surprised that the work of Marcus Luttrell (Wahlberg), the only survivor of Operation Red Wings in Afghanistan in 2005 had not been made into a film. Even though it depicts events that lead to the death of a lot of American soldiers - the title of the film pretty much indicates what's going to happen - it was a gripping story, and if only for the reason that the men who died in Afghanistan during the failed mission deserve to be immortalised.

Peter Berg's epic production (in which Luttrell, formerly a Navy SEAL corpsman and sniper, had some considerable control over the direction the film took), is a perfect way to pay tribute to three brave men - Lieutenant Michael P. 'Murph' Murphy, Danny Dietz and Matthew 'Axe' Axelson - who did not make it home to tell their own story. Berg's film is at once powerful, horrendous, gripping and emotional. It's in-your-face, and doesn't shy away from a stark and shocking depiction of modern-day war. In that way, it's not unlike the Ridley Scott masterpiece, Black Hawk Down.

The unsuccessful Operation Red Wings was drawn up as a mission to find and kill Ahmad Shah, a violent Taliban commander responsible for the deaths of many United States Marine Corps in Afghanistan’s Kunwar province. Murphy (Kitsch), Axelson (Foster), Dietz (Hirsch) and Luttrell are the four-man recon unit, and we get to learn a little about their lives away from the war – how Murphy’s fiancé wants an Arabian horse as a wedding present, and that Dietz’s wife definitely runs the show at home – before Lieutenant Erik Kristensen (Australia’s Bana) announces that the operation is a go.

The four are sent into enemy territory first to locate Shah. The idea is that they will then radio to base, and a larger force will come in to take care of the target. Except, almost from the outset, nothing goes right. Communications in the area – they are watching from high atop the slopes of a mountain called Sawtalo Sar – are scratchy at best, and as the four-man detachment is watching the village where Shah keeps his headquarters, a group of local goatherds inadvertently discovered their position. One appears to be a Taliban fighter; or, at least, he carries a radio and appears to be in communication with the rebels.

After a robust back and forth conversation to determine what would be the best course of action – kill the goatherds, tie them up or let them go – Murphy decides to let them go, even though they all know that local Taliban forces will pursue. It must have been a very hard decision to make (and is one of the best sequences in the film) and goes to show that these men were, above all else, human. They had morals. Despite the danger they knew they were wading into as a result, they did the right thing. The only thing to be done.

So, they are alone in enemy territory, cut off from communications with Bagram Air Base, and certain that they would soon be in contact with the enemy. Indeed, it doesn’t take Shah’s forces long at all. The four-man SEAL team is surrounded, by four or five times their number, and so comes the most horrific part of the movie.

Battle is joined and for the next hour, the relentless and bloody pace never slackens once, and Murphy’s team seek to evade the bulk of the enemy and make contact with their own forces for backup. The entire mountainside appears to be becoming their own Alamo. They tumble off cliffs, in scenes that almost defy believe – the battering that the bodies of these supreme warriors can take is nothing short of incredible – and keep fighting.

Slowly, though, the enemy, who has far superior numerical advantage, catch up, and the men of the recon unit begin to feel the pinch. Aside from injuries caused by tumbling over and down cliffs in an effort to escape the enemy, all four men have sustained multiple bullet wounds. Inevitably, they begin to die, and it’s very hard to watch them do so, given all that you’ve learnt about the men and their home lives. It’s tragic to watch young men, in the prime of their lives, being killed horribly before they’re really had a chance to live.

It gets worse, for although a QRF (Quick Response Force) is quickly gathered together and helicoptered to the location of the outnumbered SEALS – calling in backup was an act of heroism that cost Murphy his life – the Taliban are waiting, and a rocket-propelled grenade takes down one of the choppers, killing yet more Americans, and condemning Luttrell, by now the only one still alive, to an uncertain future.

People are comparing the big battle scene from Lone Survivor with the opening minutes of Saving Private Ryan, where the Omaha Beach D-Day landing is depicted more graphically than we’d ever seen combat depicted before. I’d say it’s worse, because by the time the battle comes around in Lone Survivor, you already know the characters and know what they have at home. Knowing that they’re not going to come home makes it harder to stomach.

In the end, Luttrell’s survival was thanks to a group of Afghani villagers who seemed to have as little love for the Taliban as the Americans forces, and take the grievously injured Luttrell into their care. One of their number is dispatched to the nearest American village with a hand-written note, the brave man walking through the mountains to deliver Luttrell’s communication. It is through this note that Luttrell is rescued, and survives.

That Luttrell was able to write, let alone breathe, through the multiple injuries he sustained was an incredible feat. The Taliban, too, weren’t let off easily. Dozens of their men were killed during the engagement. There were no winners…and the fight for Afghanistan continues. One suspects there will forever be destructive fighting in that part of the world.

The film ends with photos of the dead SEALs, and you leave the cinema realising that, even now, there are men in remote parts of the world – Australians as well as Americans – who head out into the wilds of enemy territory every day on missions very similar to Operation Red Wings. Thank God that most of them do not end as Luttrell’s did.

A powerful film. Don’t miss it!