Cast. Eric Bana, Orlando Bloom, Ewen Bremner, Hugh Dancy, Ron Eldard, William Fichtner, Ioan Gruffudd, Tom Hardy, Josh Hartnett, Jason Isaacs, Matthew Marsden, Ewan McGregor, Jeremy Piven, Sam Shepard, Tom Sizemore.
Rating. 91%
In 1998, Steven Speilberg's Saving Private Ryan heralded a new era of war films. Take your pick from the likes of The Hurt Locker (2008), Zero Dark Thirty (2013), Fury (2014), Hacksaw Ridge (2016) and Dunkirk (2017). In all these films, the bloodless battlefields where gallantry prevailed were replaced with stories steeped in the horrific reality of conflict.
Black Hawk Down recalls the US Army Rangers and US Special Forces' seemingly straightforward mission to capture a powerful Somalian warlord from the Bakaara Market, Mogadishu in the midst of a bloody civil war. Based on an actual event, journalist Mark Bowden originally reported on the incursion in The Philadelphia Inquirer at the time, before transcribing the series of reports into a best-selling book, Black Hawk Down: A Story of Modern War.
Following a fairly pedestrian introduction, providing the necessary background for sufficient exposition, the pace of the film picks up dramatically. The running gun battles and combat sequences are a relentless assault on the senses. Director Ridley Scott masterfully manages to convey the chaos of the mission without ever losing the narrative, and he is ably assisted by screenwriter Ken Nolan who does an excellent job of condensing the 15-hour ordeal into a run time of 144 minutes.
Time constraint dictates that there isn't much time for character development, but Scott manages to weave in an element of character definition of some of the key characters. As much as is necessary.
Black Hawk Down boasts an impressive cast list, which includes Eric Bana, Orlando Bloom, Ewen Bremner, William Fichtner, Ioan Gruffudd, Tom Hardy, Josh Hartnett, Jason Isaacs, Matthew Marsden, Ewan McGregor, Jeremy Piven, Sam Shepard and Tom Sizemore. The performances are solid, mainly because the actors (many in early roles) consistently downplay their parts. Josh Hartnett appears far more comfortable in this role than the doe-eyed Army Air Corp pilot, Danny Walker in Pearl Harbor. But the real stars of Black Hawk Down are character actors Eric Bana, William Fichtner and Tom Sizemore. All three manage to create memorable characters despite limited screen time.
The cinematography and editing are superb. Cinematographer Slavomir Idziak uses various lighting techniques, filters and camera positions to create a gritty realism. At times, you feel you are hunkered down with the US Rangers as bullets whizz past your head and explosions rain down dirt and debris. The multiple narratives are seamlessly combined to ensure the audience keeps up with the chaos of the conflict. Even if the onscreen characters are left in the dark.
Black Hawk Down does not attempt to analyse what happened in Somalia, instead the film concentrates on dramatising the 24 hours of hell that saw 19 US servicemen killed and more than 70 injured. Black Hawk Down is a film about combat, not politics. And the ever-dependable director successfully immerses the audience into the heart of combat.
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