Very well executed

Boring

A different way of telling a story

Excellent characters with emotional depth. My wife, daughter and granddaughter all enjoyed it...and me, too! Very good movie! You won't be disappointed.

A very historically accurate film about an obscure event in African and Cold War History. It is surprising that such a movie was made, and glad that it has. Also explains why it has become forgotten, and the moral dilemma the the commander the Irish UN forces faced. Brian Ghilliotti

Canadian soldiers have participated in many UN peacekeeping missions over the years and have known their share of failures caused by UN bungling - Gen. Romeo Dallaire and the Rwanda massacre being the best example. That history made me as a Canadian interested in a movie about this failed UN peacekeeping mission. Apparently the Irish government largely covered up this incident from the 1961 civil war in The Congo, in which a force of Irish peacekeepers was sent in under the authority of the United Nations and ended up coming under attack from a much larger force of Congolese rebels and international mercenaries. Acquitting themselves well, the fact that they were forced to surrender because they had run out of ammunition, were heavily outnumbered and because of atrocious UN bungling led to them being regarded as cowards and to their mission being considered a black mark against the Irish Army. It wasn't until the 21st century that an Irish Government review cleared "A" Company of the accusations against them and they were recognized and honoured, as they should have been all along.The story is a good one and holds up the bungling and backroom wheeling and dealing for everyone to see, while the various bunglers left "A" Company and its plight largely ignored. Where does one begin with the mistakes or bad calls that were made. An Irish company with no battle experience under the command of an officer who had read a lot about battles but had never been in one was sent into the middle of a civil war. The UN leader on the ground (O'Brien) who was an academic with no sense of the strategic realities of the situation. The French (represented in a brief scene by de Gaulle) arranging for French mercenaries to get involved in the civil war against the UN forces. A local population in the area of Jadotville (where the Irish compound was located) who didn't want the UN or the Irish there. An Irish general who seems too paralyzed to do anything. The whole thing was a tragedy waiting to happen from the very beginning.Thankfully, there's not much time given to the backstories of any of the Irish soldiers. This was meant to be a war movie (even though it was about peacekeeping) and it gets into the situation leading up to the battle pretty quickly. I thought Jamie Dornan did a fantastic job as Quinlan - the Irish commander of "A" Company, and Mark Strong as Conor Cruise O'Brien captured the image of the incompetent UN bureaucrat who knows a lot but who has no real clue what to do.This is not a very well known historical incident. I didn't realize when I sat down to watch it, for example, that this was the incident in which UN Secretary General Dag Hammerskjold was killed in a plane crash while en route to try to negotiate an end to the civil war. It's a well told story, it's only weakness perhaps being that the average viewer (not particularly aware of the incident - and I count myself among those) might have benefited from a bit more of the political background to the story, as well as a bit fuller account of the negotiations that led to the Irish troops being released after their surrender and a month in captivity. (9/10)

So he can act, may be one of the things some people might say after watching this. But it would unfair judging someone just by one movie they did (I have only seen the first 50 shades movie so far). So in company of some really good actors and in battle portraying a real incident/event from the past, he succeeds to convey more emotion than in a movie that is supposed to be about emotions/feelings.But let's stay with this, and its politics. Sometimes you find yourself being a pawn for someone else and not really being able to go anywhere else. So only thing/way to go is forward. And that's what this movie is about (and courage), amidst one of the worst situations you can find yourself imprisoned in. Since this is war, there is violence of course, and there will be almost unbelievable situations. But this actually happened (more or less), which makes it even more powerful

Ostensibly a war movie but the political intrigue and dark dealings of politicians add to the tale. The tension builds from the start but the politicians building their careers on the back of the beleaguered soldiers is the hidden tale. The end is real shocker, did they really get away with it and keep this story hidden for so long?