In truth, there is barely enough story here to make a film.

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.

I enjoyed watching this film and would recommend other to give it a try , (as I am) but this movie, although enjoyable to watch due to the better than average acting fails to add anything new to its storyline that is all too familiar to these types of movies.

Story: It's very simple but honestly that is fine.

This is without doubt one of the worst was films I have had the misfortune of seeing. The plot doesn't go anywhere by not building up any dramatic interest or tension. The acting is awful and completely unbelievable. No connection is made between the audience and the characters meaning that it really isn't very upsetting to watch the main characters deaths. The worst part of the acting though is the soldiers reactions to deaths around them which is very fake and almost laughable. This isn't helped by the terrible emergency surgery scenes, trying and failing miserably to copy the very sad one out of black hawk down. The worst thing about the film though is how unbelievable it is. The props used look cheap and appear fake. The radio the soldiers ware appear to be plastic walkie talkies kids have when they are about 6. The M4's and M16's they use are all, for some reason, different and appear plastic and fake. The RPG's never destroy anything even when they directly hit objects for example the cars and trucks the soldiers use. The worst scene though has to be when Jackson manages to kill all 3 enemies all armed with assault rifles in a pickup truck speeding away with a pistol. This is totally unrealistic and not to mention inaccurate as only officers carry pistols anyway. Another stupid scene is a "sniper" shooting and needing a spotter from about 75 yards away from his target which again is totally unrealistic. Lastly, none of the soldiers seem to be able to hold a gun properly adding to the unrealism like everything else. Overall then, this film isn't worth watching by anyone and I discourage going anywhere near it.

This shocking statement (shocking because now, four years later, the war is still clearly not over) promisingly begins what turns out to be an astonishingly bad film about the ongoing Iraq war. I am always wary when I read extreme reviews of movies on the IMDb (This is the best movie ever made, This is the worst movie ever made, etc), but in this case they are all true. This movie is so unbelievably bad that it's amazing it ever got released.Before I say anything else, I should admit that I bought the movie thinking it was some kind of documentary. I live in China so I bought a pirated copy that only had Chinese writing on it, so all I could read was American Soldiers: A Day in Iraq, which led me to believe that it was going to be something meant to inform the public about the reality of the situation on the ground, as they say. The reality of the movie, needless to say, was a tremendous disappointment.First of all, nothing is even remotely realistic. You don't have to be a battle-weary veteran to understand that war is not about occasional gunfights punctuated with casual breaks perfect for cheesy, D-movie bravado and beat-box dance sessions (I almost fell off the sofa when I saw that scene), and don't even get me started on the "Iraqis" in the movie. The accents are so bad and the delivery so talentless that it is impossible not to laugh (My home...is...your...home. It is...not...much....but it.....is....ours."), even when you think of the dismayed families of the fallen soldiers on whom the film is based, who must be shocked and insulted to see that their loved ones are being remembered with this ridiculous mess of a film. And by the way, did anyone else notice that all of the soldiers had backwards American flag patches on their shoulders? This is patriotic sacrilege and any real life soldier in Iraq with such a thing on his uniform would be viciously berated by his fellow soldiers and I imagine severely reprimanded by his superiors. Didn't anyone involved in making the movie think that such blatant defamation of the American flag might not be such a good idea in a war film, even as consistently bad as this one?Nothing is taken seriously in the movie at all ("Nobody likes being occupied, it's like living with your parents!"). The men all take turns with this idiotic schoolboy bravery ("I would give my life for the sarge!" "No I'M giving my life for the sarge!" " No, ME!" "No we'll ALL give our lives for the sarge!" "YEAH!!"), meanwhile the sarge seems to have sustained a mortal injury that renders him sleepy and a little bit sweaty for the majority of the film, but seems to just kind of go away toward the end. The "sets" are also ridiculous in the extreme. Iraq is re-created so badly and so unconvincingly that it may as well have been filmed in Canada (note: it was). There is some effort made to call attention to the fact that many soldiers joined the military because of September 11th and WMDs, but Iraq has nothing to do with either of them. This unjust inconsistency has cost thousand and thousands of lives and is even more disturbing when the film ends with this quote:"The greatest treasure our nation has is our enlisted men and women. When we put them in harm's way, it had better count for something. Their loss is a national tragedy."Sean Penn, in All the King's Men, said "Time brings all things to light." One can only hope this is also true about the reality of why we are in Iraq and who the real criminals are in the Bush administration. The only question is how high and how deep the corruption goes. In the meantime, let's stop making pathetic movies like this about the Iraq war. The news is depressing enough...

The film started out well, a knock-off of Black Hawk Down. American soldiers pinned down, showing courage and teamwork, awaiting extraction, get rescued by MPs that are transporting prisoners to a secret camp. There, the good guys witness CIA sponsored torture for the purpose of getting information from insurgents. This (naturally) bothers the good guys. It would bother anybody with a conscience. I think that's where the expression "War is Hell" comes from.Then, the unthinkable happens: Enlisted men take control of the situation, overrule the officers that are presiding over the situation at gunpoint. They (and it would take a left wing nut Canadian director Furie to lend further credibility to the situation) convince the officers that it is proper to disobey orders, so the officers join the mutiny.Then starts the liberal drivel: there were no WMDs (I recall that both Hilliary/ Bill thought there were WMDs, as did Kerry, Britain, CANADA, as well as Israel), and we're dying for an ungrateful Iraq.The movie ends with a mourning medic, questioning "What's it all about Alfie?" The writer Mellott could have provided an alternate ending on the DVD: the court martial for all survivors, with the final scene being jail house doors clanging shut at FT Leavenworth.But, with a production company titled "Peace Arch", what else would you expect? This would be a great double feature w/ Farenheit 911; the French (and French Canadian) men would have orgasms over this proposed double feature, until they died of dehydration.

I must say that I am in "shock and awe" at how bad this movie is. This film takes the traditional stereotypes and strings it together with a few action shots and creates... this. I just caught the movie on cable and I kept on watching like a sucker because I thought they would tie everything together. I am a former soldier and I just shook my head at how many unsatisfactory items came forth. Personally, I don't have a problem with the premise of the film. I get the fact they wanted to draw some non stop action to create the plot but if you are going to try to put realism into the "dramatic" scenes, do some research. I was appalled not by the "CIA torture camp" but rather the lack of leadership in the group. A "sarge" (what?) that can't focus the troops... national guard officers who can't take charge and a group of young soldier's who just float along. Unbelievable to say anything on this movie but disappointment. I found it insulting to the training and leadership that exists in the Army. From a movie standpoint, the acting isn't bad but the script is awful. The action scenes create realism but it is sabotaged by such inaccurate portrayals of what happens during the action that it is embarrassing. Avoid if possible, cheer up if you did see it. (after, you aren't the only sucker)