User reviews

Behind enemy lines is an intriguing movie. If it was based on a true story, I could see why people would be so "critical". Well folks, it's not based on true events and it's just a movie. We don't have to break down why an Admiral puts forth an order for no search and rescue or why sailors on the deck are playing football.

The movie to me is not considered a war movie but more of a survival movie.I thought Owen Wilson did a great job , Considering that he is more of a comedic actor.I served in the Navy and I'm not going to sit here and analyze a simple movie based on what's real and what's not. I liked the action , the sense of survival and the storyline. It's not a great movie but a type of movie to pass the time and keep you intrigued.

Although it's 2016, I still enjoy watching this movie.

Sure, this movie is unrealistic, slightly jingoistic, and not exactly Dr. Zhivago when it comes to a deep plot, but it's fun to watch. I'm a serious student of the military studies in a professional sense, and I fully realize that the technology (especially the missile chase) and doctrines are unrealistic, but I am also capable of suspending my critical eye when I just want to sit back and enjoy an action flick. I'll save the brain power for something that actually matters, not for a movie, which is just another form of escaping from real life for an hour or two. So yeah, this movie gets a thumbs up for a fun film to sit back and enjoy the surround sound and big screen TV while chomping on some popcorn and a Coke.

Don't a movie seriously that isn't supposed to be taken so seriously!

Once the Bosnian war ended and the western nations realised how much their own policies had contributed to the genocide of Bosnian Muslims. You had a spate of Hollywood movies that tried to atone for this by showing Serbs as unreconstructed bad guys. Obviously this would all change after 9/11.

Chris Burnett (Owen Wilson) is a bored American flight navigator on a NATO mission in the former Yugoslavia.

On a photo reconnaissance mission Burnett and his pilot come across evidence of Serb war crimes. Their plane is shot down and the pilot is captured and executed.

While Burnett runs and hides from the Serb army. Admiral Leslie McMahon Reigart (Gene Hackman) disobeys orders and sets out to rescue him.

The inclusion of Hackman means that I easily confuse this movie with Bat*21, where Hackman played a pilot shot down in Vietnam.

It just shows that how plain and undistinguished this movie is. Wilson who made his name in comedy uses this movie as a step towards action roles. Hackman plays a role he has done many times before. One more hefty pay cheque before he hits retirement.

Behind Enemy Lines ***

Bravo niner delta, what's your vector, Victor?

You'll hear lots of dialogue like that in Behind Enemy Lines. Military code talk is one of the coolest things ever. Vector, copy, come back, affirmative, negative, no-go, R(ally)P(oint)... That stuff is just plain COOL.

Back to the movie review. So – you're making a war movie with airplanes. Let's make sure you have everything you need. Stock footage? Check. Lieutenant with a ‘bad boy' attitude? Check. Stuff blowing up? Check. Politically ambiguous military situation? Che – what? That doesn't make sense. I mean, we're America... (Don't worry – We're the good guys. It's all the rest that's ambiguous.)

See, Behind Enemy Lines is set in Bosnia during the ‘last' days of the civil war in Serbia/Yugoslavia/Bosnia-Herzegovina. Chris Burnett (Wilson) is stationed on an aircraft carrier in the Adriatic Sea. The ship is commanded by Admiral Leslie Reigart (Hackman), who in turn is under the command of NATO, represented by Admiral Piquet (de Almeida). Now, Burnett is a bit of a maverick. Not like the Tom Cruise type – Burnett is tired of being in the Navy. He signed on to be a fighter pilot, not a sitting around on the ship pilot. In fact, he's handed in his resignation papers. Of course, you can't just leave in the middle of a mission. When the ship returns to port, Burnett is done. Reigart doesn't really care for Burnett – he used to have potential, but now he's just dead weight. So, in a bit of vindictiveness, Reigart assigns Burnett (a navigator) and his pilot, Stackhouse (Gabriel Macht), on a recon mission on Christmas. The recon? A lake. Lovely. But, radar picks up some activity. Activity OFF OF THE ASSIGNED COURSE. Now, we've established that Burnett is a maverick, so, naturally they do recon over there. They take pictures of mass graves. Then, they get shot down. BEHIND ENEMY LINES. This is not good. See, NATO planes were not supposed to be making fly-bys in that area. A peace treaty has just been signed, and things could fall apart at any moment. So, Reigart has a choice to make – does he risk the lives of thousands of people to get one man? Does he ensure peace and leave a man behind? We all know the answer to that.

Behind Enemy Lines is slick. It is very, very slick. Teflon. It looks like a video game. A really cool video game. Shifty frame-rates, cool filters, Matrix-style special effects, Saving Private Ryan-camera-effects, it looks way cool. It's not universally realistic, but, stylistically it works very well.

The acting is also good. No one is going to win any acting awards in this picture, but, no one stinks. If you don't know who Gene Hackman is, turn off your computer right now. You have some serious catching up to do. If you don't know who Owen Wilson is, start paying attention. This guy is good. Very, very good. You may have seen him in Zoolander (he was the blonde model). You may have seen him in Shanghai Noon with Jackie Chan. You may have seen an underrated comedy called Rushmore – he co-wrote that. He's just beginning to get recognition, and he deserves it. While I think he's better in comedies, he's no slouch as a leading-man-action-hero. Joaquim de Almeida doesn't stand out, but you've seen him before. (He played Bucho (the bad guy) in Desperado)

So, that leaves us with the story. It must be tough to make a war movie now. WWII was easy – the bad guys were easy to spot. But, to make a movie based on any war post-1970 must be tricky. Things like finding ‘bad guys' aren't easy anymore. Even in something like the Gulf War. To paraphrase Mark Wahlberg from Three Kings: `I forget... Are we shooting people anymore?' The Balkan conflict was really, really tricky. First of all, there were three sides. Secondly, there was a huge history of racial strife in the area. Thirdly, NATO stepped in to prevent the war from spreading into Macedonia, which would have brought Greece (a NATO member) and Turkey (another NATO member) into the war against each other. Fourthly, keeping all the factions straight was very, very hard unless you studied political science. Behind Enemy Lines doesn't get too bogged down in the details, which is good. Nor does it name real names. Slobodan Milosovic is not mentioned, but he is implied. The story is about an American airman in the middle of the conflict, but it's not based on the story of Lt. Scott O'Grady.

What we have here is a slick, mostly non-political (there are some references to landmines being bad for children and other living things) war movie. It's not perfectly paced, but it's close. The cinematography is really, really cool. And stuff blows up.

Let's see. Take one standard action film involving Americans, add in a new baddie for them to triumph over, and have the baddies act atrociously and brutally, then let the good guys be victorious in the end.

That about sums up BEL. It has reasonable special effects, a plot that is simple and oh so seen before, and a square jawed handsome hero (although, looking at Wilson's nose, not that handsome).

People have already remarked on various inaccuracies and symbolism such as the angel in the midst of war etc. Instead of going over those I'd like to point out the overriding message this film taught me.

That it's OK to disobey orders. Disobey them in such a way as to get your best friend killed. But that's OK, because no matter what happens when you disobey orders, it all comes out good in the end. You feel better about yourself and you'll bring the bad guys to book. So don't worry about your best friend. He was only a plot device anyway.

One thing is certain, though. As long as there is conflict in the world, there will be a Hollywood movie to glorify it and vilify the enemy.

And just who were the enemy? The Bosnians? The Serbs? The Croats? The film didn't seem very certain itself and neither was I, even at the end.

Particularly laughable (and somewhat disturbing) in this no brainer action film was the dreadful end sequence, where we get to find out (via the wonder of the subtitled explanation) what happens to the main characters.

Now, call me old-fashioned, but such final scene "what they did next" stuff in my book is reserved for two types of film - comedy spoofs and documentaries. This film is certainly no comedy, so the appearance of these notes, to me, would seem to imply that the movie was in part based in reality. I find this disturbing simply because there are any number of extremely dumb people out there that would see such final comments and assume the film was, after all, based on true events. And it's this kind of "it happened like this" cinema (which most often involves Americans saving the world) that concerns me most. U571 is another, now notorious, example of this. Apparently its true that history is written by the victors......

As for the movie, the opening scenes are the most rewarding. Once the movie passes into its middle it becomes a bit dull and the ending, as others have observed, is more like a Rambo film and gets quite farcical.

The movie is best watched whilst a few drinks shy of inebriation. You'll enjoy it more and not notice the foolishness (hopefully).

F-18 Fighter navigator Chris Burnett (Owen Wilson) is tired of boring meaningless flying over the Balkins. On a routine Christmas mission, he gets stuck on a recon mission. They go off course to scout a target, but get shot down. The Serbs find the pilot and executes him. Chris goes on the run alone against massive forces. Meanwhile Admiral Leslie McMahon Reigart (Gene Hackman) in command of the carrier sets out to rescue the down pilot despite orders not to.

There are many things going wrong with this movie. First there is no way any command would not go to Hell to rescue a down pilot. A bit of diplomacy is not going to stop any American command. The only possible excuse is logistics, and an aircraft carrier has all the logistic they need.

Then there is the standard bad guys can't shot straight. Owen Wilson is bullet proof. They are blowing up the entire country and yet they keep missing the guy. It gets ridiculous after awhile.

This is a blow em up action thriller disguised as a realistic military movie. If you forget any pretense of real danger, this is a good fun time having things explode.

This is a taut and compelling film based on true events ; it focuses a pair of brave pilots , two crack fighter pilots , the Air Force Lieutenants Burnett (Owen Wilson) and Stackhouse (Gabriel Match) . The F-14 Fighter pilots have only seen the war from 40.000 foot until they're shot down behind enemy lines , in Bosnia territory . Now the Admiral McMahon (Gene Hackman) in charge to get him out , before the Servian soldiers (Olek Kupra) and enemy forces bombing the area . However US commanding doesn't want intervene but is about a peace treatise . Stranding two pilots in enemy territory , now in order to survive , there starts a game of survival . They must fight the rebel forces that threaten their lives and retrieve photographs about massacres .

It's an adrenaline-fueled adventure with spectacular flight-scenes, suspense , tension and lots of entertainment . What's important here are the aircraft flights , shooting , noisy action and breathtaking combats . Fantastic , memorable aerial cinematography and overwhelming pursuits are the main assets of this story . Although it displays a ridiculous finale in ¨Rambo¨ style . The movie follows the wake from Bat 21 (Peter Medak with Gene Hackman , Danny Glover) in similar premise though developed in Vietnam . The picture delivers an excessive stirring camera with continuous Steadicam and it produces some headache to spectator . Hyperactive musical score adequate to action by Don Davis (Matrix) . The film is based loosely on the experiences of USAF Captain Scott O'Grady, who was shot down near the town of Mrkonjic Grad in northern Bosnia in June 1995 and was stranded in Serb-held territory for six days before being rescued by US Marines. O'Grady brought a lawsuit down on 20th Century Fox for damages to his character , he claims he didn't curse as much and never disobeyed orders . The flick was professionally directed by John Moore in his first film . Later on , he achieved successes with ¨Flight of Phoenix¨ (2004) and ¨The Omen¨ (2006) . Followed by an inferior sequel titled ¨Behind enemy lies II : Axis of evil (2006)¨ by James Dodson with Nicholas Gonzalez and Keith David and other inferior third part . Rating : Acceptable , no dull , but is quite excitement .

I truly enjoyed this movie, because it took a lighthearted approach to 'running for your life' while serving in the forces. I was, however, disheartened by the fact that Scott O'Grady brought down a law suit on the study for "portraying him" in a bad light. This movie was about anything else but Scott O'Grady. Note: Sorry Scott, but it's not about you...

I enjoyed the way Wilson took control of his character and lived up to the expectation of what one would expect from a Navy pilot. Let's not forget Gene 'The Man' Hackman. It's difficult to imagine Hackman 'not' being in the service because he does it so 'friggin' well.

The movie is suspenseful and the supporting cast is simply awesome! It's just one of those films where not enough credit was given to everyone, all around!

"Behind Enemy Lines" is a film with a bit of controversy. The story clearly was based on the experiences of US Air Force pilot Scott O'Grady...but they took great liberties with the facts and O'Grady felt he was maligned by the movie because the lead (Owen Wilson) had a lousy attitude at the beginning of the film and was insubordinate...unlike the real life O'Grady. The film also changes a lot of the facts--making the plane a two-seat Navy plane (an F-18 Super Eagle) flown from an aircraft carrier instead of the single seat F-16 O'Grady flew from an air base. Regardless, the film still is quite exciting and worth seeing.

The story begins on a US aircraft carrier. Lt. Burnett (Wilson) is annoyed flying during the 1995 cease fire over what was Yugoslavia, as they are simply flying reconnaissance missions...and avoiding combat with the Bosnians. After submitting his request for discharge from the Navy, the Admiral (Gene Hackman) chews Burnett out and assigns him extra duty...in this case, a recon mission on Christmas.

Unfortunately, the two-seat plane is shot down by Serbs...a violation of the cease fire. After both the pilot and navigator eject, the Serbs execute the pilot...and the navigator, Burnett, manages to escape and the rest of the film concerns the Serbs trying to kill Burnett because of the information he's gained from the mission about troop movements and genocide. To avoid death, Burnett runs many miles over hostile territory to safety.

As I watched the film, it became clear that the film was intended thrill audiences at the expense of common sense....especially at the end of the picture. Seeing the Admiral flying a helicopter on the rescue mission seemed pretty dopey and the US Navy would never risk a command officer on such a mission. There also were some stunts at the end which were pretty dim as well. Exciting? Yes....but at the expense of realism. In reality, helicopters AND Marine fighter planes were involved in the mission (the film onlys showed helicopters, which seemed silly flying into such hostile territory when they DID have an aircraft carrier filled with planes!).

Oh, and while it's not terribly important, the film takes place over Christmas and O'Grady's plane was actually shot down around June.

Overall, a fun film to watch but do NOT take it to be a history lesson.

Note this is not a war movie. Instead it is a survival story set during a war. Viewed in that sense, it is an incredible action-packed drama. The photography is insanely good, with some fantastic aerial shots. Hail to director John Moore for having such a clear vision of what he wanted the end product to look like. This was so incredible, it is hard to believe it was his directorial debut feature.

Owen Wilson does a styling job here, so much so that I can't understand why he does comedy more often than drama. He just does drama so well. The film has amazing visuals, fast paced action, great acting, great music, great effects, great suspense - what else could one ask for to be entertained? This was a thrill-ride from beginning to end, with never a dull moment. It just got better and better as it progressed - and what an ending!

As a Serb it was very interesting for me to watch this movie. And it's not so bad movie, even though we're shown as 'the bad guys' once again. The biggest fault was selection of the actors, because most of the actors that play Serbs are Russians and Slovaks, so their Serbian was a littlebit funny. Like if Swedish played Englishman.

I once considered this a great movie. it's still pretty awesome but is also dated at times and has some questionable parts. a few cheesy moments too. but lots of cool scenes. and fairly suspenseful throughout (about 3 viewings)

Very exciting film, giving the viewer nothing new in the way of a story. I was on the edge of my seat all the way through especially during the SAM attack on the airplane. Hackman gives his standard fine performance as the Admiral willing to scrap his career for one of his men, and Wilson does a commendable job fighting and running across dangerous ground. Thumbs up.

I'm an action film buff, so I went into Behind Enemy Lines with a good attitude. I didn't need a deep and compelling storyline, or plot, characterization, or deep themes about life.

"Behind Enemy Lines" takes a stab at saying something about the nature of war at a distance (without getting ground troops involved), but it comes across as preachy and shallow. So really it is a straight action flick.

As such, it is not bad, but nothing special. Plenty of stuff blows up and gets shot, but there are also some drawn out scenes and some monotonous running.

Who should see this movie:

-- action film buffs, but only on a rainy day

I'll give "Behind Enemy Lines" a 6 out of 10, which is the highest rating I'll give a film I wish I'd skipped.

I don't think this is really considered a "war movie" in the normal sense but it might as well be since it involves all military people and the focus is an American Navy pilot who is shot down over Bosnia and runs for his life while waiting to be rescued.

Outside of Owen Wilson ("Lt. Chris Burnett") blaspheming about a dozen times, I thought this was a very entertaining film with spectacular sound and a couple of very intense action scenes. I always find man-on-the-run stories good, anyway.

The missile-jet scene has some of the best surround sound I have ever heard in an action scene, along with super visuals. Wilson's travails, as he tries to stay alive in hostile territory while red-tape holds up his rescue efforts, are fascinating. The action scenes are quite different, too.

This is a film I guarantee will not put you to sleep and, at the same, doesn't overdo the action. The end has the usual credibility gap with what I call "Rambo mentality," but overall is a gripping story.

A movie I have taken pleasure in watching a few times over the years.

Owen Wilson is not exactly a favourite of mine but he does quite well in his role, Hackman is his usual self.

The movie is quite exciting and is pretty fast paced.

Nice film :)

Any movie starring either Gene Hackman and/or Owen Wilson is definitely worth seeing. Behind Enemy Lines isn't an above-average movie that I'd praise, but it is very entertaining. It is an average movie with some very good actors in it. It has above-average special effects and has some good intense, thriller scenes. There are parts of the movie that are a little hard to swallow but the director does a good job making it flow almost to the point where you do not notice the over-dramatic parts of the story. I liked this movie and I'll continue to watch it every now and then. People give this movie a hard time for its "unbelievable scenes." Those people should watch movies like "XXX" or "Transporter 2" and then revise those criticisms of "Behind Enemy Lines." It is a good movie that entertains well.