Alas, even though there has yet to be a really world shaking event since September 11th, we’re now in an era of films where Hollywood is celebrating the government again. Starting with “Act of Valor” in 2012, in spite of the critical lambasting, the big deal is depicting events of the government where we succeeded. The big news these days is the elimination of Osama Bin Laden as an immediate threat to our country. And now with “Act of Valor” in the background, “Seal Team Six: The Raid on Osama Bin Laden” is basically the branch off from the former, except much more Hollywoodized.
Wherein the former film gave audiences this facade of honoring the troops by casting actual marines to depict themselves, “Seal Team Six” just stuffs a lot of good looking Hollywood actors to depict soldiers on the verge of raiding the Abbottabad compound. Directed by John Stockwell, “Seal Team Six” garners an excellent cast of young actors including Freddy Rodriguez, Cam Gigandet, and Anson Mount, while pretty much depicting these newsworthy events as something of a ride directed by Michael Bay. There’s gritty filters, and dialogue about getting the job done, explorations in to discussions about strategies and military compounds, and a lot of semper fi action that will feed anyone who relies on a healthy diet of pro-military action films.
“Seal Team Six” desperately wants to be within the category of stark military award fare like “The Hurt Locker” or “Zero Dark Thirty,” but in the end it’s really just schlocky television fare like “Act of Valor” that dispenses of the pretenses of quasi-documentary tropes, and instead just turns the raid on Bin Laden in 2011 just a very goofy action film that will satisfy the military nuts, and really no one else. Featured on the Blu-Ray, there’s the seventeen minute “The Making of ‘SEAL Team Six: The Raid on Osama Bin Laden’,” an almost extensive look at the facts of the mission along with interviews with the cast and the writers of the film. As well there are glimpses in to the cast’s military training and interviews with director Stockwell’s method of directing for such a stark film. Marketing on the pro-Military rah rah USA films of the new decade, “Seal Team Six” is a sub-par and dull affair that goes through the motions of depicting soldiers as heroes and the mission as successful and really nothing else.