Gun
battles in the rainy Panamanian jungle bewilder the filmviewer
in Basic, directed by John McTiernan. Who is fighting whom
over what? Perhaps a second screening will be required
to answer the puzzle over the plot, but lost is an excellent
opportunity to present a contemporary version of the 1950
classic Rashomon. Instead, the ending is such a variation
on U Turn (1977) that few in the audience will care what
is true or false about all the corrupt, insincere, cover-your-ass
characters. Anyway, something went wrong in the jungle.
Ranger Sergeant Nathan West (played by Samuel L. Jackson),
who commands his recruits in impossible weather, presumably
dies along with some members of his squad, while the rest
shoot at each other for no apparent reason. Accordingly,
base commander Colonel Bill Styles (played by Tim Daly)
assigns two persons the task of debriefing the surviving
participants and then providing a coherent report on what
happened. They are Tom Hardy (played by John Travolta),
an alcoholic former Ranger and current Drug Enforcement
Agency official in Panamá City, and Captain Julia
Osborne (played by Connie Nielsen), head of the base's
military police. Flashbacks to the battle by the survivors
further confuse the narrative, as those interrogated have
differing versions of the events. Since there is plenty
of money to be made in the drug trade, filmviewers may
suspect that there is an obvious motive behind the mystery--greed.
The only one who is left out of the cabal is Osborne, and
she is neutralized at the end of the film. But so is the
audience, which will feel duped when big stars are unable
to shine in a cinematic black hole. MH
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