Behind Enemy Lines

So like The Kingdom, Behind Enemy Lines is a film I watched when I was younger and really enjoyed. It had a lot of content that I hadn’t been exposed to in the past and, like The Kingdom, I had blinders on because it was so cool to see that content for the first time and get pumped up the way an action movie will do to you, especially for the first time. And the more I think about this film, it’s actually timely that I watched it about the same time as The Kingdom because there are a lot of similarities between the two films and the stories behind them.

Behind Enemy Lines is loosely based off real events that took place during the Bosnian War. NATO forces are withdrawing from Bosnia due to a new treaty with the Bosnian government. Things are slowing down in the Navy, especially for the Navy pilots who just want to see some action. One such pilot is Lieutenant Chris Burnett (played by Owen Wilson) who is tired of the military and would like to leave once his unit returns from their deployment on an aircraft. Of course his commander, Admiral Leslie Reigart (played by Gene Hackman) is unhappy about this sentiment and puts Burnett on a punishment mission along with his co-pilot Lieutenant Stackhouse (played by Gabriel Macht). What starts as a routine fly by goes sour when Burnett and Stackhouse go off route on their recon mission and are shot down by Bosnian forces.

After seeing his co-pilot murdered by Bosnian military, Burnett is on the run for the rest of the film, trying to survive in enemy territory and find his way back to a safe place for the American forces to come and pick him up. Along the way, he is hunted by the Bosnian military, and a deadly assassin and he must use his survival skills to get out of his current predicament, behind enemy lines.

Now I won’t talk about the historical accuracies of this movie. I didn’t talk about what The Kingdom was supposed to be based off because both movies are “loosely” based off of real events. Both dramatize these events heavily and really shouldn’t be considered “Based on True Story” films. The reason I bring it up for Behind Enemy Lines is because while you shouldn’t take this as a “Based on a True Story” kind of film, for some reason the movie takes itself that way, especially in the end. For some reason they put up word boxes at the end like Owen Wilson changed the tide of the Bosnian war and Gene Hackman was a real admiral. This story is very, very, VERY fictionalized. That shouldn’t make you not enjoy it, just enjoy it for the action, the story, and the characters, not the historical significance.

This movie also made me realize that context is incredibly important. This movie came out in 2001 and was probably in production prior to 9/11. But before 9/11, the big conflicts that the world was interested in were The Gulf War and US involvement in Bosnia. This movie gives no context of what the conflict in Bosnia was really about and I realized, it was because you were supposed to know that at the time this movie was released.

Think about it, The Hurt Locker didn’t give any context as to why the US was in Iraq. We all know now because most people reading this were alive when the US did invade Iraq, but think about watching The Hurt Locker in 20 years. Some people might not know the context of the war and not understand why it hit a lot of chords at the time. This isn’t to be a criticism of the film, it’s just more a point of interest that I thought about during the film.

But let’s talk about the pros and cons of this movie.

The performances in this movie are actually pretty good. When I was younger, I watched this film not really knowing Owen Wilson and what he was most known for. Then I saw all his comedies and when I came back to this film and suddenly it was really distracting. I think Owen Wilson does a good job and it’s a change of pace from the movies you usually see him in, and surprisingly, I don’t think he says “Wow” in his Owen Wilson way in this film. However, watching this movie with all the knowledge I know about him, it is still distracting.

Gene Hackman gives a dynamite performance, but what are you going to expect from the great Gene Hackman. Watching this and Superman just makes me recognize more how good of an actor Hackman is and I really want to go back and start watching more of his filmography.

There are a lot of good performances in this film, but Hackman and Wilson are the big ticket names and they are the characters that the movie focuses on. They’re painted as the heroes because they’re in the US military and the Bosnians are painted as the bad guys and being that this movie was made before 9/11, of course they look incredibly Russian, and incredibly evil. Before our stereotypical villain in movies turned suspiciously Middle Eastern, they were always suspiciously Russian or Russian-like. And the movie does a good job at perpetuating that stereotype. We don’t really learn anything about the lives of the bad guys and since we’re not really given any context of the conflict (again, because at the time everyone knew why we were in Bosnia), they are just painted as the stereotypical bad guys.

And that’s one of the bad things about the movie not really explaining any of the political environments we are in. The movie is very focused in on Owen Wilson and his fight for survival. But one of the issues of the movie is that because everyone is so black and white in their motivations, it becomes a little bit difficult to explain the actions of certain characters, especially the higher ranking admiral (played by Joaquim de Almeida) who is just a heel in the movie, doing everything in his power to make the lives of our main characters difficult.

For example: Right after Burnett goes down, Hackman and everyone on the aircraft carrier wants to go after him. But then the bad admiral comes in and says, no he has to get to a safer location so as to not start an international incident. Then when they finally do want to go get him, he send French troops instead of Hackman’s guys, basically to just be a dick. There’s really no explanation to this character  because he’s the stereotypical bad admiral that I’m not sure exists. Nobody looks at a situation of a downed pilot behind enemy lines and says, “fuck him, he’ll find his own way”. The only times things like that happen is when there’s other forces at work and it would have been more interesting (at least for me) to figure out why there’s such bureaucratic red tape to go through. Instead of painting the bad admiral as the bad admiral, give him some kind of motivation and make him a person instead of just the guy who says fuck em to an American Soldier who could be killed. They kind of allude to it at one point but the truth is, he’s just there to cause drama for the rest of the movie and to make Gene Hackman turn around and do the right thing in the end, regulations be damned.

But here’s the thing, when I was younger, all I wanted to see was Owen Wilson trying to survive the elements and fight enemy in order to survive. It’s kind of like the way when I watched The Kingdom for the first time, I wanted to see this elite FBI team fight terrorists. Now I guess I’m getting older and becoming more interested in the intricacies of the story and why something progresses. In the case of this film, I realized that Owen Wilson really doesn’t do a lot in this film, at least until the end. The majority of the movie is just montages of him running through the woods. Now it is a fascinating

story of survival, but then I look at the story it was based on and the original pilot spent 6 days surviving behind enemy lines. This movie might have been a little more interesting if it had been a look into what Owen Wilson has to do to survive as a downed pilot behind enemy lines instead of just running from one close call to another. I get that it’s not the genre, but again, it’s kind of like The Kingdom where they have elements from an action film and this could just be a mindless action film, but at the same time, with this particular film, there are elements of this being a survival thriller that aren’t really explored enough to make it something really unique and good. So we’re left with something heading in two different directions and the result is okay, but not great.

There are a couple of other things that work against this movie.

The first is the visual effects. You can tell that they were trying something new with the visual effects of this film. I remember when I was a kid, the random pauses of the screen and visual style always made me think there was something wrong with my cousins copy of the film. Then when I saw the movie later, I realized, that’s not a glitch in the film, that’s how they wanted this movie to be cut. And while it’s creative, it just looks weird and a little bit sloppy.

But at the same time, one of the best parts is the scene with them in the fighter jet and they’re trying to evade the missile going towards them. They’re doing all these evasive maneuvers and it actually is a lot of fun. So the movie takes a lot of risks, I just can’t say all of them pay off. It’s a different movie watching experience and it might make you pause and might even take you out of the movie those choices are kind of weird. I personally think it’s a decently well shot movie with the exceptions where they try to be all different, but that might be enough for you when you watch it.

On top of all of that, there are A LOT of cheesy moments in this film. I think the reason this movie didn’t take that step towards the gritty survival that could have made it a really good movie, is because I’m not totally sure it was taking itself seriously the entire time. The dialogue can be cheesy at times and of course the music tends to swell in the exact moments where the movie wants you to beat your chest and yell MURICA! And there’s nothing wrong with swelling music, but it really kind of jumps the shark near the end and I couldn’t help but laugh at how cheesy this movie ends up being.

Behind Enemy Lines is a fun movie. It’s an easy to watch popcorn flick disguised as a war movie that demands to be taken seriously. In all reality, 

But here’s how you fix it.

Don’t get me wrong, I thought this was a fun change in direction with Owen Wilson. I thought it was a bold move to go into an action military movie when you’re, or will be best known for comedy. But I don’t think Owen Wilson was the right choice. Instead, you replace Owen Wilson with Tom Cruise. Think about it, Burnett spends almost the entire movie running, it’s absolutely perfect for a Tom Cruise vehicle.

And you might be saying, but Connor, Tom Cruise has already been in a military movie about a pilot,

don’t you think that that would be retreading what he did in Top Gun? And I would say yes… if this wasn’t now a Top Gun sequel.   

Yes, make Behind Enemy Lines a Top Gun sequel. Have this story be about Maverick getting involved with the Bosnian conflict. The movie has a really great fighter jet scene that does have a little bit of a Top Gun feel to it. It’s well done. But then you take away Maverick’s plane and you figure out the hero he is regardless.

I would suggest you keep Gene Hackman in the role he’s in, because c’mon… he’s Gene Hackman. But you could put Val Kilmer in a cool role where he’s trying to do what he can to save Maverick but he can’t because of the red tape he and Hackman have to go through to get off the ground to go save him. The movie fits within a timeline that it would make sense for Maverick to be a fighter pilot around this time. I don’t see why this wasn’t a thing. Behind Enemy Lines is the Top Gun sequel we never got. There are talks now about a Top Gun sequel and while I was never a fan of it to begin with, I can now point to Behind Enemy Lines and say, this is the Top Gun sequel you all want but never got.

I mean think about it? The movie is already cheesy on Top Gun levels, the entire movie would be Tom Cruise running, the timeline works, I think the only thing you would need to do is change Joaquim de Almeida’s character to either James Tolkan (or Principal Strickland from Back to the Future) and it works out perfectly!

The only reason I say Behind Enemy Lines is worthy of being a Top Gun sequel… besides the fact that it would work perfectly as a Tom Cruise vehicle, is because the movie is entertaining. It’s not great, it’s incredibly cheesy, and I feel like it could be something more. But it is an entertaining movie nonetheless. Put aside the fact that I don’t want a Top Gun sequel, especially now, I think Behind Enemy Line’s story is the closest thing to a Top Gun sequel I think we could get and actually get something we enjoy as well. On top of it would create a better franchise then the Behind Enemy Lines sequels that have come out since. The characters are pretty stereotypical but they’re entertaining. Ultimately, there’s not a lot of reasons this movie works, but those reasons are done well enough that it’s a fun movie to watch if you find it on cable. If you haven’t seen it and you like war movies, this might be one you won’t want to miss just for the sheer entertainment and cheese of the entire thing.

But what do you think of Behind Enemy Lines? What do you think of it being a Top Gun sequel? Again, all you have to do is switch out Owen Wilson with Tom Cruise? Let me know what you think. Comment and Discuss below! You can also send me your thoughts on Twitter @cmhaugen24 as well as send me requests for films I should review in the future. If you follow me on Twitter you can get updates on future movie news and reviews coming out of this blog.

I’ll leave you with this. Yes, I know, Behind Enemy Lines is not Top Gun 2. But apart of me wishes it was. Here's Tom Cruise talking about filming Top Gun and a little bit of information on the status of the actual Top Gun 2. Enjoy!