Over Dramatizing Desert Storm
"The Heroes of Desert Storm" is a dramatisation of events surrounding Operation Desert Storm focusing on the men and women who were involved as well as their families. Taking us from before the operation as Saddam Hussein refused to comply with demands and America along with the allies increasing their numbers in the area to the actual operation.
That is not much of a synopsis for "The Heroes of Desert Storm" and that is partly because it doesn't need much of a synopsis and to give detail would actually mean basically detailing every single scene which is something I don't do. Now what I am going to say is purely my opinion of this made for TV movie and not the actual events which took place and sadly as a movie "The Heroes of Desert Storm" doesn't work very well because from dialogue rich in patriotic cheese to awkward acting it feels forced and the production values make it feel low budget.
Now "The Heroes of Desert Storm" starts by trying to show us the lives of some of those Americans who would be involved in Operation Desert Storm before the operation starts. We get to see one man who can't wait to do his patriotic duty whilst a woman who is coming to the end of her military career is scared that she will be called in to action. We also hear from others who served in other wars and how they felt whilst all the time actual news footage of the trouble in the East is interwoven. And to be honest whilst this only scratches the surface it establishes the variety of people involved.
But then we get the real action and this is where to me it starts to go wrong with for example a scene a fighter pilot having just shot an enemy out of the sky and now back on land he tells his friend it was either him or me. It is such a cliche sentence and the whole sort of shell shocked delivery of it doesn't work because every thing about it is full of jingoism. And this is what happens through out the rest of the movie as whilst interwoven with this are interviews which are a lot more human when ever it returns to the dramatised footage it has that gung ho styling which makes it patriotically over the top. And don't get me wrong as I have nothing against patriotism but here it is over kill and it weakens this dramatization as it takes the focus away from the events and on to the attitude of those involved.
What this all boils down to is that purely as a movie which dramatizes the events of Operation Desert Storm "The Heroes of Desert Storm" is not the best as it has too much forced acting, cheesy dialogue and the general sense of patriotism is over whelming during all the dramatised scenes.
