Casualties of War Reviews

With this adaptation of Daniel Lang's famous New Yorker article, Brian De Palma joins the ranks of Stanley Kubrick, Francis Ford Coppola and Oliver Stone, major directors who have brought their personal visions and styles to bear on the Vietnam War. The result is often hypnotic and perversely gripping, but falls apart during its final reel. CASUALTIES OF WAR focuses on one patrol, and the inhumane treatment of a young Vietnamese girl at the hands of a calloused, crazed sergeant. Top acting honors go to Penn as the sergeant and Thuy Thu Le as the captive girl. Fox isn't bad at all; one just gets the feeling that the director and screenwriter got caught up in the dramatic situations inherent in the Penn-Thu Le conflict, and left their hero to flounder as best he could. Because Fox is so extraordinarily clean-cut, he seems more than human. This part needed a really average Joe, but one with enough feel of physical gravity to counteract Penn. Fox ends up a mere flyspeck tossed about in a violent whorl of confusion.