[Locke]

Saw Lone Survivor.

Lone Survivor has proven to be my most challenging review to write, since I started properly reviewing films in 2009. It isn't because it's some perfect vessel of filmic nirvana, actually as far as films go it isn't a particularly good one and I don't want to argue that the true events should cloud your judgement of the film version...but honestly it was pretty much impossible to keep the movie events separate from the real events themselves.

This is a tale of true heroism, a story of real people and whenever it feels like the political statements are too heavy handed, when it feels the movie may be tipping into all out jingoism, when you feel like the macho action beats are perhaps detracting from the actual point of the film or when it feels like another tale of the magical white man you're reminded once again - this actually FUCKING happened.

This is a story human limits, human spirit and is grounded in harrowing futility of life itself. Any flaws are pale in the comparison to what actually happened to the real men this film is based around and it's pretty much impossible to stay angry at a film that chronicles something this downright incredible.

Are the characters thinly drawn, is the pace downright terrible, are the tones and messages all over the map? Correct to all of them, but as a basic human being, a creature with a heart and a soul and a chemical imbalance in your brain that makes you cry at the end you just can't physically do it to yourself to say anything bad about this film. This ultimately, for me at least, basically makes the film bullet proof.

And I just find it ironic that so many other people seem to be able to turn off their emotions, and in turn entirely miss the point of the whole film. I've seen people make statements like 'war porn' which are so completely and utterly wrong in every single regard that I can't even accept that as an opinion.

This isn't a glorification of what happened during this operation, glorification of the men perhaps, but DAMN RIGHT. Are you saying the film should do otherwise? Considering why and how they ended up in the situation they did, if you do think otherwise, you may as well go get fucked. War isn't a clean cut down the middle black and white battle of good and evil, it's just as dirty and complicated as this movie presents it and I just love that.

Stylish enough to be visually interesting, but grounded enough to pack a serious punch. These are just four guys, and in the real world, no matter how elite you are - numbers are everything. Even though we know no one is going to survive but one, it's how they go down that matters.

And it does matter to us, and that is the key to the magic of Lone Survivor, and the reason why I think it's a bona fide masterpiece of cinema.