I saw this over the holidays sitting on the couch at my parents' place. The description read something like "Robert Redford, James Gandolfini, Mark Ruffalo. A general leads a revolt against a corrupt warden at a maximum security military prison." That was good enough for me- Mark Ruffalo is hot, and y'all know I love me some war movies. This one's not technically a war movie, but it's got soldiers in it, so I figured the hot guy quotient should still be pretty good.
Anyhow, I have to say this movie is totally awesome. I don't know how this one slipped under the radars and failed to become the overhyped fa
vorite of frat boys everywhere. It's like Shawshank redemption, but with hot young soldiers! Redford is predictably wise & heroic and Gandolfini is delightfully weasly. The eye candy quotient is not too shabby, though I've seen better. (Straight women of the world, please check out Band of Brothers: hot hot hot!) Mark Ruffalo is totally hot as I expected- he plays the bad boy outsider who at first questions Robert Redford's ways, then comes around and helps everyone in an awesome scene where he climbs aboard a flying helicopter, knocks out both pilots, and commandeers the thing, eventually crashing it into a guard tower then crashing on to the ground, AND he walks out of there unharmed, except with a streak of blood clinging to his face which makes him look even hotter.*SPOILER ALERT*
The ending is a totally awesome. It's like patriotism porn. Robert Redford insists on hanging this American flag upside down as a signal that the prison is no longer under control. And he totally doesn't even need to do it, because the prisoners have already won! Gandolfini goes nutso and shoots him, and Redford crawls to the flag pole and dies shortly after hanging the flag. And then... one by one the prisoners start to salute the flag, and we realize the flag is hanging right side up. God bless America indeed!
