Act of Valor

Glad I saw this film, and it was a treat to hear the director, Mike McCoy, afterward.

Lots of new tech here with the Canon D5, and special lenses - about 85% digital, and the rest 35mm film - all put together seamlessly.

As for the acting - well, they're all SEALS, and they did much of the script, creating it on a day-by-day basis, and when the script didn't work, they did their thing - as they speak to one another in a language filled with code, and when silence is needed, with hand-signals.

This is no doc - it was all shot in live-fire training - no blanks at all. They filmed in various locations around the world - so the whole thing has a very real feel to it. When the gunboats pull up at the extraction point after a hostage rescue, and those boats let go with their Gatling guns, sounding like a zipper, it's truly goose-bump time.

There's enough blood and gore to make it real, or so it seems to me. But blood and gore were not the purpose. Rather, to show these men as flesh-and-blood human beings who go to work like anyone goes to work - to do the best job possible.

McCoy noted, "these are some of the brightest people I've ever met - the communications specialists on ship, a woman, with a Ph.D in geology."

They are all professionals, and their devotion to one another is clear. They work as a team, or they can't work at all.

One of the most telling lines in the film - on board ship, prepping for a rescue operation, one of the SEALS asks, "Will they have patrols?" The Chief replies: "We don't know, but most likely they lave patrols. They do this for a living, too."

Emotionally, I kept thinking of the Russell Crowe film, Gladiator. And the Roman Empire, and the need to defend an empire's borders. America is The Empire right now - our military presence reaches around the world - we go anywhere, and perhaps rarely ask for anyone's permission. Another dramatic moment in the film - SEALS are in rubber boats, awaiting pick-up - and suddenly, from the deeps, a nuclear submarine quickly breaches; the boats scuttle onto the sub, everyone's picked up, and the sub dives again.

What with all the machinery of war - sophistication beyond anything most of us know, and men and women trained to the nth degree. I sat in the theater amazed and in wonderment.

Every empire has enemies - such is the nature of an empire. And these men (and they are all men; women are on the ships and involved in all aspects of a mission, but not on the teams), so finely trained, defend the borders and rescue those in harm's way.

It's an amazing story, well told.

But it's no puff piece for recruitment, nor a right-wing propaganda spiel.

I thought: "These men are doing their job, and doing it very well."

Though I regret America's policies at many points, I'm glad they're at work. America does have enemies, and they seek to do us harm. Like it or not, I live in the Empire, and I'm glad to live here. And I don't want anyone to wear an explosive vest and blow themselves up in any American city.

I work hard to see that the Empire is as just as it can be, and I'm grateful, at the same time, for those who keep our land safe.

It's a difficult world, and if we were not the Empire, someone else would be, and, perhaps, in time, as we replaced Britain, someone or something else will replace us - maybe China, maybe India, or who knows what or who.

Well, I'm rambling right now.

Worthy seeing in a theater?

For sure.