GUENOT PHILIPPE As I just said on Allo Ciné French website a few minutes ago, when you choose to watch a war movie, you also have to choose between realism and spectacular pop corn entertainment. Both don't fit together. Because realism - reality connection - may be more boring, more atrocious and more crazy and unbelievable than the usual large audiences movies schemes, with the good guys vs the bad guys, the love story and the "they remained happy ever after " crap. Here in this film, you have nothing of this. The soldiers who fight in Afghanistan are not TRANSFORMERS or RAMBO characters every day. Please, watch this film as a documentary like movie, so close to reality that it will deceive many silly viewers who expected a Michael Bay like flick with one hundred million dollars budget. The main problem with film critics, is that the people confound objectivity with subjectivity. Because if a movie doesn't square with the idea they had of this feature before seeing it, if that doesn't fit, they will say the film is a crap. And this jeopardizes the idea that the film may have on large potential audiences who read those prick critics as if it was the Bible. So, yes, that's a very good movie, so far it's the first picture from the director, an ex soldier himself, with a tiny budget and unknown actors.

Theo Robertson This got a lot of hype when it received its very limited release . The publicity material heavily emphasised writer/director Tom Petch served in the British army for more than eight years which is eight years longer than I served . The publicity was rather reluctant to go in to details and I don't want to sound disrespectful but Mr Petch left the army in 1997 , four years before the war on terror started . Mr Petch was a civilian when the British army entered Helmand province in 2005 and it shows . If nothing else it goes to show than former ex British military can make a dreadful war drama as badly as any British civilian peacenik The success of a war film is to bring a sense of time and place to the audience . The story is set during a British operation in Helmand in 2006 but on nearly every level the entire narrative feels like it's taking place in Vietnam in the early 1970s . Petch claims he made this film to show the lack of proper equipment and of a clear mandate British forces found themselves with in Afghanistan but is badly executed you'd think the director has an agenda somewhere As for the equipment .50 calibre machine guns constantly jam and the reason is put down to bad ammo . Not impossible I guess . I'll give the director the benefit of the doubt even if it happens a bit too often . Likewise radios not working . Apparently though the ire of Petch goes mainly towards the SA80 rifle " If it's supposed to be so good " whines one squaddie " Why don't the SAS use it ? " So if the SAS don't use a certain weapon it must be rubbish ? Not sure if that's good yardstick to judge something with " But who else uses the SA80 ? " whines Mr Whiny 40 years ago all the world's armies were split between using three assault rifles , the M-16 , the FN Fal and the AK47 . Since then nearly every country due to reasons of chauvinism has produced its own assault weapon with the British using the SA80 which is almost universally adored by everyone who uses it in the British Army and is considered better than the American M-4 carbine . Mr Whiny is obviously an obtuse contrarianWhat this makes more problematic for the film is that it ties in with a bigger picture mainly one of characterisation . A British military patrol pushes in to Taliban territory in 2006 within a couple of days morale has collapsed in to near mutiny . Seriously ? From what I've read and heard second hand from squaddies a posting to Helmand in 2006 was a dream posting . Young men join the army to fight and since 1960 no one has been forced to join the British Army . Constant tours to the 'Stan might have taken a toll on the military but this wouldn't have been the case in 2006 . Nor would morale have collapsed to the extent where soldiers constantly disobey mission orders as seen here . What makes it even worse from a logic and drama point of view is the time-frame along with a distinct lack of inciting incident and motive . I don't want to sound like a cheer leader for the Ministry Of Defence but if I had served in Afghanistan I'd feel very insulted by this film and I wouldn't be surprised if some of Mr Petch's erstwhile military colleagues are arranging a firing squad for him as I write this

david waste of £5 that I spent shopping, I spent 6 years as a tracker in SA and I've seen a better plot and action in a children's nappy, toy story has more convincing plot lines, even the basic maneuvers of this group would be wrong, terrible portrayal of the English army but on the plus side, the musical score was very good,maybe next time the crew go spend some time with a platoon, though, the scenery was excellent, i suppose it just made the English army disorganized and under supplied, the latter being true but give these boys a chance, being in a country they shouldn't be in, don't make them out to be like the characters in this movie!

service-provider Given this is a low-budget film, I wasn't expecting much. Perhaps it was going to have something to say about the war in the Middle East, about politics, interpersonal relationships, maybe even an action scene, but it really doesn't do any of that for me. Even with this initially low expectation, I was still disappointed.During a patrol we follow an incredibly unprofessional main character who complains persistently about anything/everything and is constantly putting everyone else down (just a terrible personality to have in a team; paranoid, easily stressed, quick to anger and takes it out on everyone else). I'm not entirely sure, but I think that through this character's annoyance at everything, there were some brief attempts to raise the question about whether soldiers are adequately equipped, or whether they were doing any good by being out there. The movie then ends, leaving me somewhat regretful. I don't mean to be that harsh on a low-budget film, but this really is one that I wouldn't recommend.