Hamburger Hill is set in 1969 during the Vietnam war, on 10 May a platoon of troops from the 101st Airborne Division lead by Sgt. Adam Frantz (Dylan McDermott) & Sfc. Dennis Worcester (Steven Weber) are sent to engage & fight the Vietnamese enemy at the base of hill 937 in the Ashau Valley in order take control of the hill. Over the next ten days the troops face eleven assaults & firefights as they try to seize control of the hill, a lot of soldiers die in bloody battles with the enemy as the surviving soldier who fought there called it Hamburger Hill.
Directed by John Irvin (who in reality had filmed a documentary in Vietnam during the war) this war film based on actual events from the Vietnam war came out between Oliver Stone's classic Platoon (1986) & Stanley Kubrick's classic Full Metal Jacket (1987) as Hollywood went nuts for a short time on Vietnam war films & Hamburger Hill is maybe the lesser known of the three & to be fair I think that's with good reason as while it's not a bad film by any means it's just not very entertaining. Sure I know that wars are not meant to be entertaining but films are. The script for Hamburger Hill places heavy emphasis on the drama & at 110 minutes long there's very little action if you want to call the battles that, the first forty odd minutes is your typical bonding exercise but a lot of the character's are too similar & it's hard to tell one apart from the other & there's the argument that war was like that & there were no individuals but it makes for a hard film to watch as there's no-one to really get behind or follow. There are plenty of details & I'm sure great pains were undertaken to make it realistic but I just thought it was quite dull. The dialogue is kept simple, they soldiers talk about sex, girlfriends, cars & the real world back home but never get too friendly for obvious reasons & that robs the film of an emotional core, we don't really know any of them & thus we don't really care about any of them. There are a few moments like the taped message by a soldiers girlfriend or a few bonding scenes that seem to open the film up a bit but they never go that far. The Vietnamese enemy are never seen & their side of the story is never shown, I'm sure it wasn't exactly brilliant for them either & I am sure they had many of the same problems & fears as US soldiers.
The battle scenes are alright, again going for dogged realism they are a little unexciting but again war isn't meant to be is it? They certainly don't hold the raw brutal power of those seen in Saving Private Ryan (1997) that's for sure. Overall Hamburger Hill is a decent drama about a bunch of soldiers trying to survive the best they can, while quite gritty & realistic I can't say I particularly liked Hamburger Hill although I will concede it's not a bad film in any regard, just one I didn't personally like or get much out of. Apparently an electrician was electrocuted & killed on set in front of the actor's & crew which almost shut production of the film down.
Filmed in the Philippines the production design is great & it looks nice enough but again realism doesn't always make for great entertainment. The acting is very good from a good cast, the performances are all very strong here.
Hamburger Hill is a film that I didn't really get anything out of, the battle scenes although realistic were bland & the character's although probably true to life were empty & not distinctive enough. Not really my cup of tea at all, if you were there during the Vietnam war I am not sure you would want to be reminded of it but you may get more out it then the casual viewer.
Directed by John Irvin (who in reality had filmed a documentary in Vietnam during the war) this war film based on actual events from the Vietnam war came out between Oliver Stone's classic Platoon (1986) & Stanley Kubrick's classic Full Metal Jacket (1987) as Hollywood went nuts for a short time on Vietnam war films & Hamburger Hill is maybe the lesser known of the three & to be fair I think that's with good reason as while it's not a bad film by any means it's just not very entertaining. Sure I know that wars are not meant to be entertaining but films are. The script for Hamburger Hill places heavy emphasis on the drama & at 110 minutes long there's very little action if you want to call the battles that, the first forty odd minutes is your typical bonding exercise but a lot of the character's are too similar & it's hard to tell one apart from the other & there's the argument that war was like that & there were no individuals but it makes for a hard film to watch as there's no-one to really get behind or follow. There are plenty of details & I'm sure great pains were undertaken to make it realistic but I just thought it was quite dull. The dialogue is kept simple, they soldiers talk about sex, girlfriends, cars & the real world back home but never get too friendly for obvious reasons & that robs the film of an emotional core, we don't really know any of them & thus we don't really care about any of them. There are a few moments like the taped message by a soldiers girlfriend or a few bonding scenes that seem to open the film up a bit but they never go that far. The Vietnamese enemy are never seen & their side of the story is never shown, I'm sure it wasn't exactly brilliant for them either & I am sure they had many of the same problems & fears as US soldiers.
The battle scenes are alright, again going for dogged realism they are a little unexciting but again war isn't meant to be is it? They certainly don't hold the raw brutal power of those seen in Saving Private Ryan (1997) that's for sure. Overall Hamburger Hill is a decent drama about a bunch of soldiers trying to survive the best they can, while quite gritty & realistic I can't say I particularly liked Hamburger Hill although I will concede it's not a bad film in any regard, just one I didn't personally like or get much out of. Apparently an electrician was electrocuted & killed on set in front of the actor's & crew which almost shut production of the film down.
Filmed in the Philippines the production design is great & it looks nice enough but again realism doesn't always make for great entertainment. The acting is very good from a good cast, the performances are all very strong here.
Hamburger Hill is a film that I didn't really get anything out of, the battle scenes although realistic were bland & the character's although probably true to life were empty & not distinctive enough. Not really my cup of tea at all, if you were there during the Vietnam war I am not sure you would want to be reminded of it but you may get more out it then the casual viewer.