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Absolutely Fantastic

Absolutely Brilliant!

It's complicated... I really like the directing, acting and writing but, there are issues with the way it's shot that I just can't deny. As much as I love the storytelling and the fantastic performance but, there are also certain scenes that didn't need to exist.

It’s not bad or unwatchable but despite the amplitude of the spectacle, the end result is underwhelming.

The title is from Herodotus who recorded from a plaque left by the several hundred Spartan warriors who died at the Battle of Thermopylae around 480BC. "Go, tell the Spartans, stranger passing by. That here, obedient to their laws, we lie." This is a war movie and carries several recognizable stereotypes but not the OLD stereotypes, not the braggart from Texas or the wise guy from New York, but rather men who differ in their attitudes towards the war. Burt Lancaster is the experienced veteran of World War II, practical and kind of old for the rank of major. There is the gung ho lieutenant who is fiercely patriotic and desires nothing more than to kill Gooks. There is the educated naive corporal who refuses to reveal why he volunteered for Vietnam, and who is portrayed as an idiot begging the children of a village to accept chocolate from him. There is the seasoned master sergeant who knows it all but is burned out and takes to booze when off duty, unlike some of the others who are doing hard dope. There is the native guide who is usually used for comedy but here represents the stern and unyielding fact that war is brutal and there is no room for kindness. The black guy who handles communications at the command center provides some comedy relief. And there is the intelligence officer, the new lieutenant, who brings to Lancaster's command a systematic way of judging the threat to each outpost, and at whom Lancaster stares in wide-eyed disbelief as the officious young man gives his pitch. Some of the characters are overdrawn.It's odd to see Americans and South Vietnamese using old-fashioned weapons of World War II. The Vietnamese seem like children carrying M-1s that are too big for them. No M-16s or anything. That came later. This is 1964 in the jungles of South Vietnam and we don't have many facilities available there, yet. It's from a novel written by Daniel Ford, the correspondent, not John Ford's grandson. Ford was able to get down with his men. He ate their rations, slept on a blanket in the bush, and bonded with them. He's left a blog in which he explains the difficulty he had getting his "novel" published and sold. Nobody was interested in Vietnam, yet. I remember the general lack of interest in 1964. I was about to leave civilization for a few years and my roommate brought my attention to an inconspicuous article in the New York Times about our increasing involvement. I politely dismissed its importance.It was an ironic war in many respects, impossible to tell the good villagers from the bad villagers, much like today's asymmetric warfare. And politics was woven in and out of the war itself. Lancaster has learned that an outpost is about to be attacked so he asks for air support. There is a problem. The aircraft are grounded in Saigon because they may be necessary to suppress a coup against the South Vietnamese government. The American advisors don't win very much, if anything at all. The final scene doesn't bring up the usual "The End" because it wasn't the end. It just shows us "1964", with another decade of misery to come.

Released in 1978, "Go Tell the Spartans" stars Burt Lancaster as Maj. Barker, the CO of a remote outpost in Vietnam in 1964, when America was still only functioning in an advisory capacity. Barker and his executive officer, Captain Olivetti (Marc Singer), receive four new replacements whom they send to garrison the deserted "village" of Muc Wa deep in the jungle. One of the replacements is draftee Cpl. Courcey (Craig Wasson). Then the Viet Cong attack. People wanting a conventional war flick should skip this one because, as noted above, Americans were still functioning as military advisors at this early stage, not that there isn't any war action; just that "Go Tell the Spartans" establishes the situation in Vietnam before the USA entered into all-out war. I like this movie and it provides some good insights about the War, but I can't in good conscience give it a higher rating because I don't want to mislead people into thinking it's better than what it is. For one, it's noticeably low-budget compared to "Apocalypse Now" (1979), "Platoon" (1986), "Casualties of War" (1989) and "We Were Soldiers" (2002). Secondly, it's not as compelling as any of these movies, not to mention it's burdened by a lame, dated score. It's also too talky, which wouldn't be an issue if the dialogue were more interesting. Despite these criticisms there are numerous positives: It shows what happens when you transplant American youths from the safe haven of the USA into a war-burdened country on the other side of the world where the hardened enemy is literally entrenched in the ground and has been fighting for almost a decade before the Americans even arrived. It's not just a case of culture shock, but also brutal war shock, and the movie successfully shows this. I also like how a certain character makes a stand in the third act, which enlightens someone else and spurs a life-changing decision. Nevertheless, it's a lesser Vietnam War flick and overrated in some circles. The movie runs 114 minutes and was shot in Valencia, California. GRADE: C+

In a recent biography of Burt Lancaster, Go Tell The Spartans is described as the best Vietnam war film that nobody ever saw. Hopefully with television and video products that will be corrected.I prefer to think of it as a prequel to Platoon. This film is set in 1964 when America's participation was limited to advisers by this time raised to about 20,000 of them by President Kennedy. Whether if Kennedy had lived and won a second term he would have increased our commitment to a half a million men as Lyndon Johnson did is open to much historical speculation.Major Burt Lancaster heads such an advisory team with his number two Captain Marc Singer. They get some replacements and a new assignment to build a fortress where the French tried years ago and failed.The replacements are a really mixed bag, a sergeant who Lancaster has served with before and respects highly in Jonathan Goldsmith, a very green and eager second lieutenant in Joe Unger, a demolitions man who is a draftee and at that time Vietnam service was a strictly volunteer thing in Craig Wasson, and a medic who is also a junkie in Dennis Howard. For one reason or another all of these get sent forward to build that outpost in a place that suddenly has acquired military significance. I said before this could be a prequel to Platoon. Platoon is set in the time a few years later when the USA was fully militarily committed in Vietnam. Platoon raises the same issues about the futility of that war, but I think Go Tell The Spartans does a much better job. Hard to bring your best effort into the fight since who and what you're fighting and fighting for seems to change weekly.Originally this project was for William Holden and I'm surprised Holden passed on it. Maybe for the better because Lancaster strikes just the right note as the professional soldier in what was a backwater assignment who politics has passed over for promotion. Knowing all that you will understand why Lancaster makes the final decision he does.Two others of note are Evan Kim who is the head of the South Vietnamese regulars and interpreter who Lancaster and company are training. He epitomizes the brutality of the struggle for us in a way that we can't appreciate from the other side because we never meet any of the Viet Cong by name. Dolph Sweet plays the general in charge of the American Vietnam commitment, a General Harnitz. He is closest to a real character because the general in charge their before Johnson raised the troop levels and put in William Westmoreland was Paul Harkins. Joe Unger is who I think gives the best performance as the shavetail lieutenant with all the conventional ideas of war and believes we have got to be with the good guys since we are Americans. He learns fast that you issue uniforms for a reason and wars against people who don't have them are the most difficult.I think one could get a deep understanding of just what America faced in 1964 in Vietnam by watching Go Tell The Spartans.

Compared with many war films that covered America's involvement with Vietnam, "Go Tell the Spartans' didn't set the world alight due to its very understated style and low-scale resources, but because of centering towards a steady character/situation driven story, it remained an thoughtfully harrowing and toughly grim account showing that there were no heroes, or anything to gain from this war. Leading the way is the commanding presence of Burt Lancaster's inspired performance barking out his dialogue, but holding a truly genuine rapport with his mainly unprepared soldiers. He's not in it for pride, as his knows this isn't the place for it.Vietnam, 1964. American forces haven't been fully deployed into the Vietnamese jungles yet, but Major Asa Barker is assigned to set up a barricade at an abandoned post at Muc Wa (where 10 years earlier 302 French soldiers were massacred by the Viet Cong), but at his disposal is only a few American soldiers and ragtag bunch of Vietnamese volunteer soldiers. Soon making there presence known, the motley crew come up against overwhelming odds to hold the barricade.Directed by Ted Post (who noticeably helm Clint Eastwood in 'Hang Em' High' and 'Magnum Force'... plus made the weird horror 'The Baby'), it's tautly handled in very candid, no-frills way. This forthrightly grounded touch, lend it to having some almost TV-like qualities (like the mechanical camera-work and spotty editing) but on the other hand it gave it true grit and an imitate cloud that stamped in a realistically raw air. This meant the dramas (psychological/psychical) while there (and this is a fairly laborious and talkative film confronting the issues of war and politics), were never overdone or overly milked, but still having enough kick to leave an impression. I read some complaints about it being flat or lacking emotion… but I thought it did enough questioning the naïve involvement (doubts outweighing the for) and the state of mind of their soldiers (looking at misguided obligations). Wendell Mayes' hardened script (who adapted the screenplay from Daniel Ford's 'Incident at Muc Wa') is precisely stimulating in its text be it personal or tactical, but also worked in is some welcoming humor. Outside of Lancaster, there are solidly humane and rounded performances from the cast in the likes of David Clennon, Jonathan Goldsmith, Joe Unger, Dennis Howard, Dennis Howard, Craig Wasson, Dolph Sweet, James Hong and Marc Singer. The literary is heavy, but the roughly rampaging action (intense firefights) might only be minor, still it's staged with excellent ferocity and alertness that it becomes like a disorienting blur (definitely the night sequences) amongst the harshly authentic surrounding terrain. You can feel its setting itself up for a big one, and when it happens the 'you know what' really hit's the fan. Despite the cheap origins 'Go Tell The Spartans' is an accomplished effort deserving a lot more merit, both meaningful and scathing without being pushy in its text, but also visuals.