Best line in the film -Warning! Spoilers! Do NOT read this until AFTER you have watched the film.-
Around 1:35 in the film, when Albert (Chris Tucker) is in the bathroom talking to Lynn about what "they call in my business, a Hollywood Moment."
As he is reassuring him, he says that he will, "Go all the way to China to get this film made if he has to."
So meta. So awesome. Even the cinematography there, with the pep talk to Lynn "..more Americans need to see the war like you guys do.." was straight out of a prior generation American propaganda flick. Vocal tone. Framing.
Ang Lee and the rest of the team did an amazing job with this. If any hour's plus worth of film can communicate so, so many of the true dynamics involved in the "War on Terror", this is the film to do it.
This film should be mandatory viewing for all middle school or high school students. The characters and dialogue are so over the top sarcastic and poignant, that I truly believe all but the most dense and indoctrinated Americans will be forced to think and question by this film.
The moment where the union thugs, whose conflict started over their slighted authority to clear the stage previously, ambush the shoulders, really drives how upside down our society has become with regards to where the reins of power are. They are there in hands those who put on the show to support the empire. Not those whose story is propagandized to in the first place.
Military or Minimum Wage Service, which one will it be? Too many Americans are forced with that brutal choice for survival. This film does an amazing job of touching upon the absurdity between 'rich' and 'poor'.
Above and beyond everything this film did well, the dialogue and casting for Garrett Hedlund as the SSGT leader of Bravo was beyond stellar. He perfectly projected that manipulative technique, that the military uses as a lever to keep some of the most good intentioned troops engaged in combat.
"No matter how screwed up the mission. No matter how dire the circumstances. It is all about the man to your left, and to your right. They are there for you, and you are there for them."
Or as it was written in the film. (paraphrased) "I need you Billy. I need you to help me keep these guys alive." It was the moment that Lynn decided to stay with the guys. It is a moment that anyone who has ever made a commitment to someone else, and had that commitment tested in a manner that few ever will, can perfectly understand.
I hope that people, after watching this film, take a real hard look at what is going on behind the reasons they are given. That they look at the reasons television, and the Internet give them for supporting a government, that sends good men, to do violence in some of the poorest places on earth, for the benefit of fewer than 1% of the world's population. Not just less than 1% of America's population, but of the world's population.
"It would take a real hero to stand up to our country." as Kathryn (Kristen Stewart) says at the end.
But first, heroes would have to unplug from the narrative.