Review of Rescue Dawn (2007) by William S — 01 Feb 2011

Rescue Dawn.

Part war movie, part prison film, and part jungle-survival tale, Rescue Dawn tells the true story of US Navy pilot Dieter Dengler (played here by Christian Bale), who after being shot down and captured during a mission over Laos, escaped from a Vietcong prison camp and trekked hundreds of miles through the jungle before being rescued by American Helicopters.

The story proceeds very quickly at first. After some mission briefings and a visit to the quartermaster's office, Dieter flies his bombing run and is promptly shot down. His efforts to evade capture succeed only briefly, and soon he is an unwilling companion to a Vietcong patrol which delivers him to a remote prison camp. Here he meets his fellow prisoners; Gene, Duane, and three South Vietnamese, all of whom were pilots for Transamerica Airlines.

These men have been here for over a year- two and a half in Gene's case- and the strain of their confinement clearly shows. Gene in particular has started to come unhinged. His ramblings and delusions provide a degree of comic relieve and generate sympathy, but at the same time his fractured mental state poses a threat to Dieter's plans of escape. In his mind, the fighting will end and they'll be released any day now, as long as they behave themselves and don't try anything stupid. The contest of wills provides one of the main conflicts in the middle section of the film. But it's in the movie's second half, beginning with the escape, that things really pick up. From here on out the good guys are alone and on the run deep in enemy territory. To be caught is almost certainly to be killed.

The truly inspiring thing about this movie is how Dieter never allows himself to be broken, no matter what he goes through. Given the chance to receive better treatment by signing an anti-American proclamation, he refuses. Shackled to the floor of his hut by night and given insufficient food by jailers, he encourages the others, while holding on to his determination to escape. And no matter how tired he gets, or how many setbacks he suffers on his jungle trek, he finds a way to keep pressing on.

Hertzog has done a good job with the casting. Bales' intensity and his willingness to take on physically and mentally challenging roles make him an excellent choice play the lead in this film. It's not every actor who will agree claw his way through dense jungle underbrush, float through rapids, or be covered in leeches. This being a Herzog film, there are no back lot sets or computer effects when actual locations and old fashioned stunt work will do. And as always, the director captures the beauty of his jungle surroundings, even when emphasizing their inhospitableness. When you think about it, Rescue Dawn has a much in common with a survival program on the Discovery Channel as with the average 'Nam movie.

Hertzog is also wise to avoid going into the larger issues surrounding the Vietnam War, neither taking a stance for, or against American policy and actions in the conflict. Such questions are beyond the scope of this story, and would only strike a moralizing tone. Although far from his best work, Rescue Dawn is a highly engaging and inspiring story of one man's unbeatable will.