Black Hawk Down
Black Smoke Rising Against That Blue Sky
Black Hawk Down may not be the best war movie ever made, but it is hands-down the most realistic. Black Hawk Down is determined to show us the details of war; it is all about the persistent hail of bullets and the dangers that lurk from the rooftops and alleyways of Mogadishu. It is interested in the way men in combat communicate, from the terse radio commands of the American forces to the towering columns of black smoke that rise against the blue sky, tire fires lit by locals to warn the Somali warlords that American helicopters have left their base. Black Hawk Down puts us into the midst of the action, places us inside the helicopters racing down the African coastline, puts us on the streets of Mogadishu where reckless Somali militiamen race into enemy fire, puts us in the driver’s seat of a Humm-Vee through hostile territory.
The movie’s extraordinary sense of reality and verisimilitude reaches beyond the sharp edges of combat. Black Hawk Down manages to capture the sheer insanity of war - not just the loss of life or the heroic deeds but all the absurdity of combat. The Bakara Market battle was absurd on many levels, essentially it involves untrained, barefoot Somali militia shooting at well-trained, better armed American forces so that they can continue to shoot at unarmed civilians who are starving to death all around them. Black Hawk Down doesn’t even try to pretend that the politics of the area are anything but nonsense. From the unrelenting, iron logic of the increasing American involvement (and its bleak absurdist revelation that someone needs to go rescue the soldiers who were sent to rescue the Rangers who were sent to rescue the helicopter crew) to the near-comic presence of the Pakistani peace-keeping forces to the occasional macabre juxtaposition of battleground and playground, the insane unreality of combat is as much a part of Black Hawk Down as the helicopters and the bullets and the clouds of dust that permeate its landscape.
It is that absurdist quality that separates Black Hawk Down from other American war movies. For example, you get the sense that the Somalis are not the enemy; we don’t have the same gut reaction to them we would have seeing a line of Nazi infantry. There’s almost a sense that they’re not an enemy force - they just happen to be shooting at our soldiers. As a result, there’s a conspicuous absence of flag-waving or patriotic fervor or even simple honor in our feat of arms. Black Hawk Down is about maintaining courage and pride in the wake of an awful disaster; it’s about survival, and counting on the men in your unit, and holding out bravely until help comes. It is about the vivid and graphic portrayal of bravery and bloodletting and butchery and brotherhood.
The quality of the acting is high, with a few outstanding performances. William Fitchner is at his least twitchy as a dedicated Delta Force sergeant, Josh Hartnett rescues his career as an introspective Ranger troop leader, Sam Shepard is impressive as the tenacious major general, and Tom Sizemore was born to make war movies. But it’s not the acting that you’ll remember from this movie; the savage imagery is what counts.
Black Hawk Down is a splendid, almost unprecedented, piece of filmmaking that yanks you out of your comfortable seat and drops you into the danger zone of Mogadishu and never lets go. More than any other movie this year, it deserves to be seen on the big screen. It is a stunning, praiseworthy achievement, and Ridley Scott deserves the Oscar for Best Director for making the story immediate, graphic, personal, and real.