WindTalkers

Though there's been an abundance of war movies lately (ranging from the excellent Black Hawk Down to the overwrought We Were Soldiers), Windtalkers brings a fresh angle to this worn-out genre by telling the story of Navajo Indian code talkers.
Set during the Second World War, the film opens with two very different men arriving at boot camp. The first, a veteran soldier named Joe (Nicolas Cage), harbors a tremendous amount of guilt over the loss of his previous platoon. The second, fresh-faced Indian cadet Ben Yahzee (Adam Beach), has been recruited as part of the army's new plan for keeping their code safe (all their previous attempts at surreptitious communication have been intercepted and broken by the enemy). The army has instead developed a new code, based upon the Navajo Indian language, and intends to send out a small number of Indians who can speak it. Each Navajo is assigned a bodyguard of sorts, in the guise of experienced soldiers. Ben is paired with Joe, but his attempts to make friends with the seasoned Marine are met with hostility. What Ben doesn't understand (and what Joe has been made all-too-aware of) is that should Ben be captured by the enemy, Joe has been ordered to kill the man - lest the code be broken. The rest of the film delivers exactly what you'd expect out of such a movie: War violence and lots of it.
Though it never really breaks any new ground in terms of its plot or characters, Windtalkers still stands out as one of the better war flicks to hit theaters in a good long while due mostly to creative direction and stellar acting. What really makes the film worth checking out (in a well-equipped theater, preferably) are the spectacular action sequences. Woo has never been known as a subtle director and his skills are put to good use here. Though his signature "doves-flying-in-slow-motion" shot is nowhere to be found, the swooping camerawork that's made him famous works especially well here. Let's face it, with the extreme proliferation of war movies, it takes a lot to create one that stands out (just ask Mel Gibson). And Woo's done it, by taking those cliches and using them to his advantage. Sure, some of the characters in Windtalkers seem awfully familiar, but when the story is this exciting and moves this quickly, that's pretty much inevitable. The only way out of that is to make a movie like Black Hawk Down, which - though certainly unique and harrowing - had characters that were virtually indistinguishable from one another.
And as exciting as much of Windtalkers is, all of that would mean nothing without solid acting and characters worth rooting for. Cage, a thoroughly underappreciated actor, is very good as the bitter and grizzled veteran who reluctantly accepts the undesirable mission. But it's Beach who emerges as the standout. Known primarily for appearances in small movies like Smoke Signals, Beach proves that he's got what it takes to share the spotlight with someone as recognizable as Cage. It's their rocky relationship that gives the film its heart. There's also a lot of familiar faces in supporting roles, including Mark Ruffalo and Peter Stormare, but it's Christian Slater as a soldier with the same assignment as Cage that winds up the surprise of the movie. Slater, who's been keeping an unusually low profile as of late, demonstrates why he used to be such a big box office draw.
The only fault of Windtalkers comes in the use of some really shoddy-looking stock footage, appearing in the form of guns atop a naval ship. Those guns were not exactly seamlessly integrated into the rest of the film, leading me to wonder why Woo and co. would skimp on such a pivotal point. Regardless, Windtalkers is one of the most exciting (not to mention violent) war movies to emerge in quite some time. This is the sort of movie that screams big screen treatment. Don't miss it.
****out of *****