Customer Reviews

Go Tell the Spartans

5 star:		(34)
4 star:		(12)
3 star:		(6)
2 star:		(4)
1 star:		(7)

 

 

In 480BCE 300 Spartan Hoplites held a pass for the better part of 3 days against a Persian force that may have numbered over 200,000 men. The Spartans were aided by around 7,000 coalition troops during the first 2 days. However, they were dismissed on the 3rd day. The Spartans, their Helots and the Thespians allies died to a last man. It was one of the most gallant stands in all of military history.

To this day there is an inscription on the funeral mound @ Thermopylae that serves as a memorial to their sacrifice. An English translation is as follows:

GO TELL THE SPARTANS, STRANGER PASSING BY
THAT HERE OBEDIENT TO THEIR LAWS WE LIE.

The title of this movie is an allusion to Thermopylae. However, the film itself is about the earliest days of Vietnam. It recounts a time not long after the fall of Dien Bien Pu; an epoch when the U.S. did not have a commitment of a significant number of troops. During the period covered in this movie all that we had over there were a handful of military advisors.

The film details an obscure event at a Vietnam village known as Muc Wa. Although the battle itself will not likely even find its way into the footnotes of history, it nevertheless serves as an excellent "premonition" of what was to come. It narrates how much the U.S. underestimated the fighting prowess and resolve of the Viet Cong. In fact, Muc Wa can be said to be a microcosm of how the entire Vietnam War went for the United States.

The cast of the film is fairly impressive. The lead is taken by Burt Lancaster who portrays a Major who is asked to do the impossible with almost no resources at all. A very young Marc Singer plays his XO. Craig Wasson (best known for his leading role in Brian Depalma's BODY DOUBLE) plays a shy young corporal.

This is a terrific Vietnam movie that encapsulates just about everything that went wrong for the U.S. in the ill-fated conflict. It's a must see for all who seek to learn and understand the facts of the early stages and how it all went downhill from there.

I first saw this film in the theater. It was genuine. I rate it high. I would recommend it without reservation, except, if what you know about Vietnam you learned from Hollywood or on campus, it may surprise you. It's not about what the other movie makers wanted to show you, to shock you, to entertain, to proselytize. I never kept a scorecard of technical deficiencies, but to my mind, "Go Tell the Spartans was unmatched by Vietnam stories on film until "We Were Soldiers" in 2002, nearly a quarter century later. There were several others that tried hard. One prolific and self-assured reviewer has rated "Spartans" a one star and does a "Siskel and Ebert" number on it, during which, unwittingly, he discredits his own commentary, at least in the eyes of this veteran, when he says Go Tell the Spartans "...is no way comparable to the great post-Vietnam War films...Apocalypse Now, Taxidriver, Platoon, Born in the USA, and finally the devastating Full Metal Jacket..." Really? Apocalypse Now was a fairy tale! It may have been great storyline and cinematography, as were the Lord of the Rings, but fairy tales, none the less. And, Stone's movies seemed more defaming of real soldiers, with political overtones. I returned from Vietnam in 1969. I know a man who was in Vietnam 15 years earlier - 5 years before our country acknowledged our first casualties [The Memorial dates the war from 1959 to 1975]. There are many millions of stories about Vietnam over the course of a changing war that was the longest in our history. Go Tell the Spartans is one such story. It wasn't the most memorable, by Hollywood standards. But it was compelling. And it was the most believable. And, in this veteran's assessment, whatever its warts, Go Tell the Spartans was the best until "We Were Soldiers".

This is one of the best war movies ever made, even though there are few battle scenes and the focus is on circumstances and personalities. The setting is southern Vietnam in 1964, before large numbers of American ground troops were committed. The Americans were still in an "advisory" and support role, although they were already fighting and dying.
Burt Lancaster is superb as a hardened major trying to keep a handle on a senseless situation. His explanation of why he is still a major after so many years is one of the classic scenes in all of film. He deadpans a hilarious scene very well as he describes an incident with the wife of a superior.
All of the absurdity of the American involvement in Vietnam appears in the movie. Ordered to garrison a useless post against his wishes, Lancaster complies and then the post is abandoned, leaving the troops to fight their way out and back to base. An extended family of Viet Cong sympathizers are found and befriended, over the objections of the experienced American and Vietnamese troops. The naïve Americans talk about "winning the hearts and minds" only to be proven wrong.
This is very likely the most historically accurate movie about the Vietnam war ever made. "Civilian" VietCong soldiers fighting and dying, the bribing of opulent Vietnamese officers to get them to fight what is their war and frustration at the pointless policies combine with superb performances to make it one of the best "historical" movies ever made.

This excellent but neglected film was recently released on videocassette and is well worth your purchase and viewing. I first saw it in a badly edited format on cable television, and it was still powerful. I was delighted to find that HBO had released the film on videocassette. _Go Tell the Spartans_ tells a short story that chronicles the Vietnam War in microcosm, and though ostensibly set in 1964 reveals a number of the essential, underlying flaws in the U.S. involvement that resulted in our ultimate withdrawal.

This is, however, no dreamy, introspective _Apocalypse Now_, nor is the film a weepy, self-pitying confessional like _Platoon_. With a fraction of the production budget of those films, Ted Post did a remarkable job in producing a gritty, honest, fast-paced work.

Burt Lancaster is at his understated best as the dead-ended but still professional Major Asa Barker. Craig Wasson plays the willing but inexperienced draftee, Corporal Coursey. The interplay between these two is at the heart of the film as one generation of soldiers tries its best to hand-off to another, in a war that concededly is going nowhere. The other characters represent the various types that one encounters in other, later Vietnam films (the burned-out suicidal noncom, the doper, the ticket-punching officer, the seductive villager who is a VC), but even these stereotypes are more convincingly and sympathetically played than in later, "evil U.S. imperialist" movies.

While I suspect that the author, Dan Ford, is too hard on himself in his review of the movie, he should get the credit for the concept and characters that resulted in this excellent film. As an interpretive work, this film will stand the test of time.

Other reviewers have stated that this is "early" Viet Nam. This is true. My husband (US Army Rtd) was a Green Beret in Nam and in the conflict from 1960 until late 1966. What makes this a must have for us, is that the parts played in the actual movie are loosely based on Charlie's old unit. Charlie was actually the radioman, I don't remember the name of the actor who played his part. We have old photos of the actual men portrayed in this movie by actors. My husband has kept in contact with many of these men over the years. Most of whom now are gone. Our VHS tape of this has been loaned out over and over again to his Army friends. I can only pray that when the DVD version comes out the DVD is of good quality. Other's have said many good things about this movie, so I won't go into more detail about the actual movie. We are anxiously awaiting it's release here!

I was too young to remember the Vietnam conflict firsthand so I do not have strong passions one way or the other. I do, however, hope that any portrayal of the war treat the men who fought there fairly and honorably. On this count "Go Tell the Spartans" does so. The setting of the film is in the rural outskirts of South Vietnam where a few American advisors are posted with a few ARVN regulars under their command. Their assignment is to protect a seemingly insignificant village outpost. It wouldn't seem that this would be a target of Vietcong activity but little in this war made sense conventionally. What the makers of this film are trying to convey is that this skirmish is a microcosm of the larger battle that was to come. They wait until the end of the picture to announce to powerful effect that it is 1964, the year prior to the escalation of the war. The battle of Muc Wa is a small piece of a big puzzle but it is a harbinger of the ominous things to come. Burt Lancaster is effectively worldweary as Major Barker, a man who fought honorably in two prior conflicts but has the foresight to see his current assignment as a sucker's deal. The largely unknown cast, both American and Asian, are effectively utilized here. Standouts are Craig Wasson as a soldier who idealistically volunteers for Vietnam only to have his illusions shattered and Jonathan Goldsmith as a sergeant whose been in Vietnam too long. The Vietnam conflict has produced many compelling films and "Go Tell the Spartans" can be honorably mentioned in this impressive canon of films.

I served 3 combat tours in South Vietnam. the first was in 1962-1963 under MAAG (Military Assistance Advisory Group). I have seen this movie and have placed an order for a copy on DVD. A lot of what is shown was true on what you had to do to get along and get the job done. It is a super movie and a depiction of life in South Vietnam during the early years.

Go Tell the Spartans is one of the best, albeit little known, movies about the Viet Nam war, which was overshadowed by Platoon, Hamburger Hill and Full Metal Jacket.

It takes place in the early years of the war, when a few Americans were in-country as advisors to the South Vietnamese government(s). Burt Lancaster does an outstanding job as a team commander, whose career is on a downward slide following some mischief in Washington. His job is to help hold the line from the early Viet Cong infiltrations and attacks in the South.

His support troops range from an educated draftee and a drugged out medic, to a young hotshot captain wanting to earn his CIB and a senior staff NCO who has been in combat a little too often.

The movie is a fine character study and, although movies are the last place to learn history, this one gives a pretty good view of how we got involved and the politics that was rampant in the South - a Viet Nam veteran's perspective.

The violence is minimal for a war movie. This one is definately character driven. See it. You won't regret it.

When this movie appeared in 1978, I told my parents to go see it because it said everthing I had not found a way to describe and it had everthing I experienced in Nam in 1968 except the smells. I am delighted it is now on video for a new generation to see. I always wondered why it only played for one week in Washington DC and then disappeared. It is a most realistic portrayal without preaching, a strong statement against war without being against the soldiers who had to fight. A long time Lancaster fan, I hold this to be his best work.

This is a well acted movie with a good story line . Burt Lancaster does a great job . My favorite part is Lancaster telling the story of how he fell from grace as a generals aid and ended up in Vietnam .As others have stated the production does have a "made for TV feel" to it which is a shame .