We Were Soldiers (2002) on Netflix
In 1965, Lieutenant Colonel Hal Moore takes a new air cavalry battalion to Vietnam. When an American base is attacked, he leads 400 men into the Ia Drang Valley.
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- Rotten Tomatoes63%
Trailer
Plot summary
In 1965, Hal Moore is given a battalion of the newly formed air cavalry to train and lead. He promises his soldiers and their families that he will bring them all home. Once in Vietnam, he is ordered to hunt down the North Vietnamese force that struck an American base, with 400 men and no intelligence on the enemy's numbers. His troops land in the Ia Drang Valley at a clearing called landing zone X-Ray. A captured scout tells them the site is the base camp of a veteran North Vietnamese division of 4,000 men. Back at the base, Julie Moore leads the wives of the soldiers.
Cast
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about We Were Soldiers (2002)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- In the source book Hal Moore complains, “Every damn Hollywood movie got [the Vietnam war] wrong,” and director Randall Wallace said that comment inspired him and left him “determined to get it right this time”.
- Retired Colonel Rick Rescorla, a central figure in the book, was disappointed after reading the script to learn that he and his unit had been left out of the film.
- Hal Moore, who had long been critical of many Vietnam War films for their negative portrayals of American servicemen, publicly expressed approval of this one and is featured in segments of the DVD.
SPOILER
The film ends with a heroic charge under Lt. Col. Hal Moore that destroys the Vietnamese reserve and wins the battle, a fact the director noted in his commentary; there was no heroic final charge in the book, and the North Vietnamese forces were not destroyed.SPOILER
The Vietnamese commander, Lt. Col. Nguyen Huu An, did not see the conclusion at Landing Zone X-Ray as the end of combat: fighting continued the next day at Landing Zone Albany, where the 2/7th, with A Company 1/5th, found themselves in a fight for their lives against his reserve.
