MOVIE REVIEW - 13 Hours

The new Michael Bay flick, 13 Hours:The Secret Soldiers of Benghazi is out this week to less than a stellar opening at the box office.

But as low as the first week take was (about 16 million) the national critics liked this, and so did most of the people who saw it. But this may be a case of time of the year, and maybe people being a bit war-weary.  But in all honesty this is worth seeing. Although this is good to a degree, this doesn't have the teeth it could have had, which would have made this a better movie.

This is the story told through the eyes of six very brave soldiers contracted by the CIA in Benghazi in 2012 who showed incredible bravery and saved a ton of lives when the attacks happened there on September 11. We all know that 4 Americans were killed that day and the lack of response from the USA was less than good.  What we have never learned in total is why that was. And after seeing this, we still don't.  If you're going to see this to learn why things went poorly the way they did, you will not. And to me that is the weak link by far in this movie.

But the action and the story here is totally worth telling. These guys holding off a huge flock of terrorists over the course of a long day and night.  These guys were flying below the radar, and were  not even officially supposed to be there in any way. And that was part of their problem.  They were denied.  But what is absolute, without them and their amazing skills, a lot more Americans would have been killed that day.

This is long on action, and the story is true. So there is an emotional response received here that is strong.  These are just guys, doing a job in one of the worst places on earth.  This moves along nicely, but could have been a bit shorter and been more effective. The star of this movie, is the movie. As with most Bay flicks there is tons of action.

13 Hours.  Could have been a more poignant movie, but they sidestepped that and went to action. Good, solid movie.  Should have been braver in its overall storytelling.