Casualties of War is a great war movie fueled by stellar performances from all the cast members. It is very realistic and gritty. It hides nothing and shows the true ugliness of war and what it can do to a soldier.
It’s not a movie I find enjoyable for the usual reasons. Eriksson’s character played by Michael J. Fox defines this morality story with his voice of reason, justice, and standing up for his good morals in the face of pressure from his corrupt teammates.
The battle scenes featured in this film are very well done, but they take a backseat to the great performances and message that Casualties of War presents. Sean Penn is excellent as the once honorable soldier gone wrong. His facial expressions throughout the movie are a bit comical, as is his voice at times. You will find yourself hating his character, the Sgt. Tony Meserve while you finish watching. He becomes a real scumbag.
This is the first John C. Reilly movie I’ve seen in which also happens to be his debut. He is not a very handsome man and plays the role of a really unintelligent “Bullwinkle” type soldier very well. You wonder if the creators of Casualties of War were trying to imply that his intelligence is tied to the mentally challenged aspect of him. It also makes you wonder how the character with the baffling stupidity of him passed the IQ test to get into the military.
As much as I didn’t like Sean Penn in this movie, I really found Cpl. Thomas E. Clark played Don Harvey very well, an irredeemable piece of trash. He was really psychotic and menacing in the movie. I’m not excusing Tony Meserve’s actions, but he didn’t start out as a villain in the movie. Clark is just plain evil in Casualties of War. This is my favorite Michael J. Fox performance and he is very believable as a soldier who finally stands up for what is right. John Leguizamo (in this, his first film) seems a bit lost at times.
He looks very buff in his role, which is understandable. He becomes an excellent actor later in his career. Ving Rhames, in this opening role, is very good at his idiotic nonchalance as the approach to Eriksson’s problem, as Lieutenant Reilly. The kidnapped, raped, and ultimately murdered Vietnamese girl played by Thuy Thu Le is quite depressing to watch throughout this film.
His performance highlights this tragic story. Her facial expressions and cries of anguish seem so real to her highly traumatized and suffering character. The haunting and depressing theme song of Casualties of War makes the scenes of rape and the murder of the young Vietnamese woman even more depressing to watch. It’s not a pretty thing to see the girl finally fall to her death after being shot multiple times. Another scene that was very disturbing is the hospital scene where the wounded soldiers scream in severe pain. A poor man has no legs and his stumps move up and down.
This is one of the best war movies made in America. It’s not an epic war movie and not as good as Platoon, Apocalypse Now and Full Metal Jacket. What turned me off a bit about this movie was the excessive profanity. I’ve never liked that in any of my movies that I see. It impoverishes the quality of a movie. Casualties of War is a good movie to have in your collection, it’s so depressing that you won’t want to watch it over and over again.
