American Soldiers: A Day In Iraq

 This is going to be a short and sweet review as this movie is utter, utter crap!!!! It is very rare that I ever use the fast forward button when watching a movie but using it meant I half way watched this. Doesn't it piss you off when you spend money on a movie which turns out to be soooooo bad you are reluctant to turn it off and waste said funds? This is the sad position I found myself in whilst watching this pollution to the eyes on Saturday night.

 The thing with American Soldiers is that it is actually trying to portray very serious and real events which happen to soldiers within Iraq. The problem is that it does it very badly. The acting is absolutely atrocious to say the least. It would have to be near the worst I have endured in any movie I have ever watched. It was painful and made a mockery of what the movie was trying to achieve.

 Then there are the special effects. Atrocious, appalling, and feeble at best, they are so laughably lame it is agony to sit through. In one scene a truck bomb is driven up close to a building the soldiers are holed up in. It prematurely goes off, and it is pathetic. I have had stronger farts that would do more damage than this so called 'truck bomb'. If that was a real truck bomb everything around it would have been laid waste. All we get is a small puff of smoke, some flames, and everyone goes' whew, that was close'. I mean come on!!! If you want to see what a truck bomb can do look no further than the 1982 truck bombing of the Marine barracks in Beiruit. The whole building was completely leveled and a massive crater left in the ground. Scary stuff.

 All the explosions in this movie are poor. For instance the RPG rounds go off in a small shower of unrealistic sparks, and grenades in a small puff of smoke. Crap, crap, crap!! But worst of all is the small arms fire. Cars that are shot at miraculously recieve no holes, in fact anything that is supposedly hit recives no physical damage. Oh god it it all so awful to behold!! Soldiers with belt fed weapons have belts that are not actually feeding and yet supposedly spraying an uncommon amount of lead about. But worst of all is these must be the worst shots in cinematic history. I haven't seen shooting so badly depicted since the terrible affront to my intellect that was Harley Davidson and the Marlboro Man. And THAT was bad!!

 The battle scenes are disgraceful. It may be trying to be a serious attempt to show us the insurgency in Iraq, but all this does is belittle it all with lameness. This in my opinion would have to be one of the worst war movies ever made. I admire the attempt but if want the real deal as to what American Soldiers is trying to portray then look no further than the brilliance of The Hurt Locker. It does what American Soldiers just doesn't do, namely deliver the goods. It is realistic, gritty, and totally uncompromising in showing the viewer what a shitty mess Iraq is and how those who serve feel about being there.

 This movie could have so much better with better acting and special effects. The plot and script are fine, but the manner in which it is executed is the let down. American Soldiers should be avoided by all. There are better movies made on Iraq, and a myriad of good books published. Watch them, read them , but what ever you do, do not watch this!!!!!!! This is a genuine 1 out of 10, and that is for effort alone and nothing else.

Click here if you want to waste anymore time on this rubbish:

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0425743/