But with such a shoddy vehicle for that message, including the cluttered action that attempts to mask it, no one will buy it. Void of all pivotal parts of a narrative motion picture-a story with real actors and believable characters, for example-the film, like a TV ad or propaganda film, essentially tries to sell us a product, an idea, a message, one that equates war and American soldiers with righteousness and virtue. The shaky cams and behind-the-gun first-person perspectives make the film look more like a video game or commercial than a movie-which pretty much sums up Act of Valor as a whole. Using a chaotic, incomprehensible style, the directors put us right in the middle of the action they try to capture tone visually, but it merely causes the action to be confusing. Just one problem: McCoy and Waugh don't know how to shoot an action sequence.
To be fair, Act of Valor cares little about anything besides its action sequences, which make up most of the film. Even more, in the midst of all the death and violence, the SEALs yell out the tritest one-liners, like when one shouts, "This could be big trouble in little China!" While probably realistic to some degree, they call each other "dude," "bro," "brother," and "asshole," all while literally slapping each other on the butt. The worst of the dialogue comes in the conversations between the SEALs. His alleged nuggets of insight-like the opening quote of "When you get old, people stop thinking you're dangerous"-all prove banal. The narrator, whose voice sounds as ridiculously deep as Christian Bale's Batman, delivers the most trite, unimaginative dialogue. Johnstad's shoddy script includes cliché after cliché. The lines they're given don't help one bit. After ten minutes of contrived goodbyes and trite lines about men and war, the mission begins, and the action follows. A voiceover briefly introduces the characters as they prepare to leave their families, but that's it. In terms of a story, this plot is the extent of it. Focusing so closely on the validity of details, the filmmakers forget almost every valuable component of cinema-like, say, a story, which in the end makes it play more like an ad for the Navy than an actual movie.ĭirected by Mike McCoy and Scott Waugh and written by Kurt Johnstad, Act of Valor follows a squad of Navy SEALs as they go on a mission to rescue a CIA agent and stop a group of terrorists from bombing the U.S.
In this desperate effort, though, it unfortunately does just the opposite. From a cast made up of real Navy SEALs, to dialogue filled with military jargon, to a plot centered around the war on terror, the film wants us to believe that what we're seeing truly represents soldier life. Act of Valor tries so hard to be authentic.
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