The Hanoi Hilton (1987)

What a beautiful movie!

Sick Product of a Sick System

It’s an especially fun movie from a director and cast who are clearly having a good time allowing themselves to let loose.

All of these films share one commonality, that being a kind of emotional center that humanizes a cast of monsters.

I really do love the smell of conspiracy theories in the morning. Sadly the post of jw_55767 proves once again that most people prefer their ideological myths to reality.So lets look more closely at some of JW's myths about this film. First, the theory that Hanoi Hilton disappeared because of a cabal of the rights favourite demon, "Hanoi Jane" and her media mogul husband Ted Turner. Turner. Wrong. Hanoi Hilton was released theatrically. It made, as IMDb notes less than a million dollars. All things being equal this means, if the market is always right as right wing apologists and polemicists usually maintain, Hanoi Hilton was voted down by American consumers and was not systematically hidden away by Ms. Fonda or her media mogul husband so no one could see it.Second, another favourite strategy of right wingers is to play up the atrocities of the enemy, which did occur, war after all is hell, and play down those of their own country. In reality, however, Americans committed atrocities in Vietnam just like the enemy did. One of many examples: My Lai. Atrocities, of course, have occurred in each and every modern war and they were committed by all sides.

This movie is a bit of an oddity to me. On the one hand it feels like very mediocre handling of a serious subject. On the other hand, it has some compelling scenes sprinkled, sparingly, over it. I feel for the soldiers and their perdicerment but the movie just gets bogged down in itself. Like it had no real direction to follow and just throws everything on the screen in a desperate hope that something will stick. If the filmmakers had spent more time on story development and less time on tired war clichés this would have been a much better film. Still, I keep going back to watch it because there is potential in this film. Here is my list of things that this movie could have done better.1). War Clichés: This movie was RIFE with every tired war cliché in the book. From the Evil Camp Comendant that acts like a petty dictator who plays mind games with the prisoners. To senior ranking officer who taps his monologue of inspiration via Morse code. You try not to groan but just cant help it.2). Focus! Focus! Focus!: This movie was all over the place. One minute the prisoners are in isolation the next they are being tortured the next they are being paraded and ridiculed the next they meet up with American anti war protesters! Come on! Too much on the plate! If they had zeroed in on one, or at most, two themes they might have developed a more grounded story.Hopefully, somebody someday will attempt another movie about this subject. When they do, I recommend that they watch this movie very carefully and beware of the pitfalls and mistakes it made.

This movie is about as entertaining as watching my grandmother (rip) prepare a plate of cheese and low sodium crackers. Frankly I feel cheated. I bought this FULL PRICE brand new 2008 Warner Bros DVD from Amazon for a ridiculous $17.99 + shipping (I could have bought 3 early 1990's Wesley Snipes features for that price dammit). A Cannon Pictures film from 1987 Reagan-Land I was expecting a Chuck Norris/Michael Dudikoff style R rated action extravaganza with 'Nam soldiers shooting auto mag retribution at their sadistic communist captors...instead I was graced with an agonizing 125 minutes of grown men weeping and middle aged POW's bitching about 'the Longhairs back home'. Despite what I thought, this is a DRAMATIC film, NOT an action film. The body count is a realistic and pathetic 2 or 3, and other than a couple brief electro torture scenes and a few naughty words, this film is pretty uptight and proper viewing. The ENTIRE film, save for the first 4 minutes, takes place inside the famed Hanoi Hilton prisoner camp (North Vietnam circa. late 1960's). Granted this story may 'have heart' and 'show it like it really was for those brave boys', but I don't usually watch B-grade bare-bones scripted movies for their emotional depth. There is no real 1980s style 'star' here, but rather a throwback to the WWII films of the early 1960's where a large and all male cast share equal billing. I didn't recognize any actor save for two; a redheaded Jeffrey Jones from Ferris Bueller's Day Off as a heart-of-gold POW, and General Quoc himself Aki Aleong about to reprise his role for Braddock: Missing in Action III as head of the prison. Like a proper and authorized story, the movie ends when the US government negotiates the release of all the POW's in East Asia, and they all weep for joy at their newfound freedom, cue credits. You can tell that the director was aiming this film at an older audience, likely for men who were POW's in the 1960's because these types of ultra-orthodox narratives would bore anyone from the MTV generation. Also the hyper-simplistic My-Government-Right-Or- Wrong mentality is really out of date by even this post-Iran Contra time in the late 1980's. But I do give this film credit for depicting the North Vietnamese officials as sadistic as they did, especially this one greasy haired Cuban bastard. All in all, this is a boring and at times uncomfortable (read: homo-erotic) film to watch, and it's over-simplistic patriotism and storyline is a big turn off.

Hanoi Hilton is an excellent movie that captures the horror and the pain that American POWs had to face during the Vietnam War. It is NOT a political movie as some naive liberals would write in the comments section--nor is it right-wing grandstanding. The fact is that the Vietnamese people were downright horrible and tortured our men on a regular basis is historical fact. The fact that Jane Fonda, and other Hollywood idiot who would NEVER ever serve this great country (yet expect all the benefits American soldiers have given them)went to Nam and insulted the prisoners is an absolute fact. Those who write that this is a political movie are part of the problems with America--those who have never served, those who are too cowardice to serve, and those who spit on and insult the American soldier. Not one of them would have had the courage to withstand the torture and mayhem these brave men had to face each and every day. You should be saluting these men and not insulting them. These men are part of the reason you have MTV, HBO, NFL, freedom, the right to vote, etc--why America is free.