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Windtalkers is one of those utterly predictable and ultimately shallow "war flicks" that tries to put an important face on all the carnage, yet 85% of the movie consists of blood for shock value and explosions for the "gee whiz" factor. Not since the 1985 Oscar-winner Missing in Action 2: The Beginning have I seen this many ridiculous "grenade gags". You know the drill: hero throws grenade, grenade explodes, several enemies go hurtling through the air like baseballs. That the Chuck Norris "grenade gag" occurs about 7 times during Windtalkers is a good indication of how serious-minded the film is.

Nicolas Cage (opting to work in blank zombie mode this time out) plays Sgt. Joe Enders, an commander who has recently lost his entire platoon (it was his fault, of course) to a wide array of colorful deaths. After stewing about with a bum ear at the local vet's hospital, Enders is given a new assignment; he's to be paired up with a Native American 'codetalker' who will be able to relay important coordinates and recipes without them pesky Japanese listening in. Enders is ordered to protect codetalker Yahzee at all costs...unless of course they're both captured...in which case Enders would be forced to protect the code (ie - kill Yahzee) in overtly dramatic fashion.

Nothing sums up a good war epic like a plot than can be described in one sentence, and Windtalkers nails that one plot device into the blood-soaked ground. It's obvious that by adding the whole 'noble savage' and 'cure racism through warfare' themes, the filmmakers were hoping to add a little meat to this essentially insubstantial affair, but the "code" stuff is given perhaps 20 minutes screen time, and the rest of what's on display isn't exactly anything to hoot and holler for.

When you say a film has "lots of action", that's almost always a compliment. But in the case of Windtalkers, the numerous battle sequences are choppy, uninvolving, and more than a little derivative. Aside from the aforementioned grenade gag, Windtalkers hosts a laundry list of war flick cliches that should have been retired along with Ronald Reagan. If I told you there was one racist soldier who refuses to accept the Navajo soldiers, would that stun you? Or would you make the next logical connection - that the racist soldier would soon be on the receiving end of some good ol' Navajo heroics. This same exact plot hook is used in every war movie! Do they really think moviegoers sitting through Windtalkers haven't seen The Patriot or Glory?

I digress. Lazy screenwriting is as predictable as tax season, and about as enjoyable. To be completely honest, I find a screenplay littered with one yawning cliche after another an insult to my intelligence, so the 'other stuff' better be pretty damn good.

In this case, the 'other stuff' is nearly as bad. Though Windtalkers certainly has a copious amount of battleground explosions and flying bullets, very few of these sequences actually pound your pulse. There's the indefinable little internal oomph you get when you're watching a great action sequence, and I didn't get that sensation once during Windtalkers. The action scenes seem too polished, too rote, and way too overbaked. Much like in the vastly superior Black Hawk Down, the unending sea of enemies pour forth from the jungle like so many Romero zombies. Our soldiers plow right through them and more pop up.

The performances are uniformly acceptable, with only Cage's incessant glower a consistent bore. Adam Beach (Mystery Alaska) plays the dimensionless Yahzee with all the charm he can muster, but the character is written to be a Navajo Superman Saint, so he doesn't have too many shades to work with. Christian Slater (Heathers) adds some color as another 'code protector', while Jason Isaacs (The Patriot) shows up just just long enough to make you wish he had more scenes. Likable character actors Peter Stormare, Mark Ruffalo and Noah Emmerich get to put on camoflague and play War with the big boys. Good for them.

I don't know why anyone thought John Woo was the right guy for a wartime action drama, but it's clear that Woo works best indoors...and in Hong Kong. His American films (Face/Off, Broken Arrow, Mission: Impossible 2) have all been no better than 'interesting failures', despite what the Box-Office Gods may have to say. (OK, I really dug Face/Off, but that doesn't necessarily make it a good film.) The director's affinity for 'operatic carnage' is given free reign over these WWII battlefields, yet each successive skirmish is as tiresome and paint-by-numberesque as the one before.

A couple of cool jolts and a few tips of the hat to cinematographer Jeffrey Kimball save this one from being a total disaster. Windtalkers is strictly a 'going-through-the-motions' motion picture product, one that's entirely beholden to earlier (and infinitely better) war films.

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originally posted: 06/15/02 16:20:50
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