12 Strong

     12 Strong directed by Nicolai Fuglsig and written by Ted Tally, Peter Craig is an action movie. It is about Captain Mitch Nelson(Chris Hemsworth) who after the events of 9/11 feels a sense of patriotism and gathers his team to do a mission in Afghanistan. The mission they have to do is get General Dostum (Navid Negahban) to the Taliban stronghold. They don't have the resources the Taliban have so they ride horses into battle.

     This movie is nothing special, it hits every beat a typical army movie has and does nothing new. Michael Pena's character is the worst one in this movie. In the beginning he is mad at Chris Hemsworth for leaving the team, instead of having his character become more fond of Chris throughout the movie, the next time we see them they are perfectly fine. Michael and Chris share this awkward scene at the end where I guess they bond but it just seems like something they decided to shoot last minute. Michael Pena is also the comic relief in this movie, his jokes land less then half the time, but his character seems out of place with the serious tone they were trying to achieve. They weren't able to build any tension. 

     It is hard to say the climax of this was implausible because I do not know the real life story, but at least with the movie. The climax is so poorly shot it takes you out of this supposed to be epic moment because it is so implausible. Besides the character and the story the movie is competently made, with some decent acting, and decent looking shots. Nothing stands out and in the end if you have see one army movie you have seen this one.

2/5