I almost saw 12 Strong in the theaters because any movie with Michael Shannon is a must see movie regardless of the quality, but then I saw that it starred Chris Hemsworth and put it in the queue without a second thought. Other than Thor: Ragnarok, movies starring Hemsworth are generally meh for me: Blackhat and In the Heart of the Sea, which was a great book. 12 Strong is also an adaptation of a book, Horse Soldiers. If a viewer who also read the book told me that the movie fell short of the actual story, how Task Force Dagger succeeded in capturing Mazar in Afghanistan with the current Afghani Vice President Dostum, I would not be surprised.
12 Strong is one of those movies that tells rather than shows until the denouement. The dominant story is whether or not Hemsworth’s character, Captain Mitch Nelson, “Cap,” which is disconcerting if you’re a Marvel fan, will be right or wrong. The other characters repeatedly doubt him because of his age, his lack of experience, his relationships, but the movie never explains why his men trust him. I know that he is Thor, and spoiler alert, as I mentioned before, the tribal leader that he later works with becomes vice president, but I have no idea why people decided that he was awesome. The movie should have started a little earlier to establish why his character was a leader with vision who could do what no one could do before. It is possible that I missed it, and the movie did depict it, but I think that it is relying on casting and film associations, which undercut the movie, not bolster it. The writers mistakenly think that the real tension of the film is his leadership style, but unless the payoff is showing that everyone was right, and the film chronicled his character development as he struggled with loss and accepted that ordering the death of those that he loved was the key to success, then it was a waste of time because there is actually zero character development, and the movie is stagnant.
I’m really happy that I did not pay money to see it in theaters. 12 Strong is 2 hours and 10 minutes, and it isn’t until 1 hour and 47 minutes into the movie that it begins to visually distinguish what makes this battle different from other movies about real life military maneuvers: horses versus tanks. The real story is not the conflicting personalities, but the logistics. Frankly if I had known up front that animals would be in danger, I would have skipped this movie. I’m one of those annoying people who could watch throngs of people cut down in movies without batting an eyelash because I’m desensitized from decades of viewing experience, but if there is even a possibility that an animal will be near danger, I’ll start tearing up and will be traumatized for days if anything actually happens. My wailing alarms all who live with me. With that said, even I thought the horse acting was tremendous. This horse gave the fiercest performance in the movie in a single scene despite 12 Strong having a great cast, but they are not given anything as striking to do.
12 Strong spends an equal amount of time showing the initial discord in the group then its harmony on the field before splitting apart the team and relegating the impressive supporting cast to the margins off screen until they are needed to bring a little humor by making a wisecrack. I have no idea what Michael Shannon’s character’s responsibilities were on the team, but I know that whatever it was, it was important. Michael Pena does nothing but play a human humorous version of decorative bookends and disappears on a secret, crucial, deadly mission, which I suppose there was no time to actually see.
It also doesn’t help that 12 Strong is supposed to make you feel good because America won, but as an audience, you know that we are still over there, and it isn’t over. It doesn’t matter that the movie explicitly has characters remind the audience that it isn’t about winning the war, but the triumph of this particular battle. It still feels weird, especially since the movie really wants to end on a high note that without America, rival tribal leaders would not come together to defeat the Taliban. If the movie had not hit the happy ending note so hard or done a better job of narrowing its focus to the battle and nothing else, it could have worked, but why restrict focus when you can show 9-11 again because God knows that it is rare to see that traumatic event. Oh wait, it isn’t.
Am I the only one who was actively annoyed that 12 Strong made it seem as if Putin was on the phone with Bush and had the US’ back as if he was trying to stop 9-11 from happening? It is true that Putin was eager to make Bush an ally and spoke to him for forty minutes, which was an unprecedented warming of relations with the US, but most world leaders behaved similarly. During the Cold War, Russia played a special historical role in Afghanistan that explicitly informs Cap’s strategy as what not to do and was one of many countries that contributed in Operation Enduring Freedom though it did not actively invade with US forces, but this movie was filmed after the 2016 election. To only focus on Russia seems like an odd choice to make us stay sympathetic to a country that is currently actively engaged in cyber warfare with the US. It may have only been a few seconds, but it happens early and sets the tone of the film. I’m glad that I didn’t give my money to this movie.
If anyone wants to make another film adaptation of Horse Soldiers, there is plenty of room for improvement. I’ll defer to people with military experience whether or not it is a good war movie. The real men behind the film enjoyed it, but also think that 12 Strong fell somewhat short in depicting how grueling their job was. I am on the fence whether or not I will read the book, but I will say that if you’re on the fence regarding whether or not to see this movie, skip it or fast forward and just watch the last half hour.