Rules of Engagement (2000)

Wow! Such a good movie.

What a beautiful movie!

The movie's not perfect, but it sticks the landing of its message. It was engaging - thrilling at times - and I personally thought it was a great time.

This is a coming of age storyline that you've seen in one form or another for decades. It takes a truly unique voice to make yet another one worth watching.

This is a really classic court movie. It really reminded me of Men Of Honor's court scene. Ouch both movies were made in the year 2000. Still it's a good movie with great acting.

Released in 2000, "Rules of Engagement" is about two Marine officers, Childers (Samuel L. Jackson) and Hodge (Tommy Lee Jones), who have a relationship going back to Vietnam. Childers is charged with murder after leading a team to the Yemen embassy to save the Ambassador and his family during a violent "demonstration" (more like an all-out attack) and calls on Hodge to defend him. To save face, the National Security Adviser (Bruce Greenwood) wants Childers to be the scapegoat at all costs, disregarding blatant evidence to the contrary. Can Hodge, an alcoholic and mediocre lawyer at best, save his buddy who once saved his life? Guy Pierce plays the prosecutor while Ben Kingsley & Anne Archer play the Ambassador and his wife.This is a war-drama by the maker of 1973's "The Exorcist" and 1977's "Sorcerer" similar in tone/plot to 1992's "A Few Good Men." I like "Rules" better, despite some flaws (like being contrived). It may not have an iconic line like "You can't handle the truth!" but it has quality combat action (which "A Few" didn't have) and the story of the protagonists is just more compelling IMHO. The movie's effectiveness hinges on Jackson and Jones convincing us of their characters, their relationship and their crisis, which they easily do. Some critics have decried the film as "racist" (naturally), but it's more like telling the awful truth with 2012's infamous Benghazigate scandal lending support. Director Friedkin said the movie's not anti-Arab, anti-Muslim and certainly not anti-Yemen, it's anti-terrorist. Bear in mind that the King of Morocco had to read and approve the script before the filmmakers could use Morocco for locations and nobody participating from the Arab side of things felt the film was anti-Arab.One critic complained about a peripheral character not resurfacing at the end, but why pan a story for NOT being predictable?The blurb at the end makes it seem like the movie was based on a true story, but it's not. It simply reveals what happens to the characters after the story ends so the viewers aren't left in the air.The movie runs 128 minutes and was shot in Morocco (substituting for Yemen), South Carolina (Vietnam), Virginia and Washington DC.GRADE: B+

I cannot say I fully comprehend precisely what the writers were thinking... well, in fact it is just plain puzzling. They wanted to write a courtroom drama but when it came time to actually think of a point for the court case they apparently just drew a blank and decided to massacre a load of civilians for no conceivable reason.The scene is just... ridiculous. So ridiculous I simply gave up watching. Samuel L Jackson (why is it every character he plays is called 'Samuel L Jackson'?) clearly sees the gunmen are on the roof when they fly in. The marines decide the best way of dealing with this situation is to run about on top of the ramparts and give the enemy a nice little game of duck hunt... rather than say, returning fire. Even if they had some standing order not to fire I think this rather gets superseded when half your men have just been shot...Then when it comes time to engage Sam decides the best thing to do is to fire into a crowd of people throwing rocks as opposed to actually shooting the people shooting him... just... why? It seems there are genuinely a hundred other ways they could have had their civilian massacre plot short of just having the guy order his troops to pointless massacre them. He could have called in some inaccurate fire on a position, a building could have collapsed into the crowd from taking suppressive fire... even if he had just slipped whilst trying to throw a grenade it would have been more plausible. Ultimately I would have carried on watching it if this scene made the slightest bit of sense. If he had ordered his marines to fire on the snipers on the rooftops and had some of the women and children that were visibly clustered amongst them take some hits they still could have racked up the inordinate body count they so craved. Perhaps we could even see one or two rookie marines shoot into the crowd after mistaking a rock for incoming fire only for Sam to order them to stop. The prosecution would then be that of a looking for a scapegoat to avoid an international incident and the audience would be on the side of the war veteran defendant.I gave up before the court case even started because frankly it would have been more plausible if they were trying to sue a unicorn from space for causing World War Three...I am annoyed that I watched the first half hour of preamble in what looked to be a good film with a good cast only to find that the writer is a goddamn retard.

A military action / courtroom drama combo platter that promises to pay special attention to the thin gray line separating morality and duty for occupying troops. It knows how to best use its stars - Tommy Lee Jones gets plenty of time to chew screen as a grizzled retiring Marine attorney, while Sam Jackson is given free reign to scream and shout both on and off the battlefield - but is somewhat less sure how to arrive at the conclusion it wants to leave us with. A forced attempt to cram an evil mastermind into the fray disagrees with the otherwise-universal theme that there is no black and white picture in a situation as difficult and politically charged as this one, and that's not the only scene that should have been shown the cutting room floor. Despite a few heated exchanges between Jones and the prosecuting attorney (a fiery turn by Guy Pearce), it's a great load of topical potential that never amounts to more than a weak fizzle and a sudden, puzzling jury decision.