MOVIE REEL: ‘12 Strong’ a perfect mix of humour and action

12 Strong (also known as 12 Strong:The Declassified True Story of the Horse Soldiers) is a movie that is inspired by true events that followed the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on America.

This was the deadliest terrorist attack carried out on US soil in terms of both casualties and fatalities, which led to the invasion of Afghanistan less than a months after that.

Though the response was still swift, what the world didn’t know was that the US acted immediately, though clandestinely, after the attack to set things in motion for that all-out war on Afghanistan to work out as well as it did.

The film stars Chris Hemsworth, Michael Shannon, Michael Peña, Navid Negahban, Trevante Rhodes, Geoff Stults, Thad Luckinbill, William Fichtner and Rob Riggle.

It is based on Doug Stanton's non-fiction book Horse Soldiers, which tells the story of CIA paramilitary officers and US Special Forces, in addition to United States Air Force Combat Control Team, sent to Afghanistan immediately after the attacks.

The movie unfolds just moments after the planes fly into the Twin Towers and US national security and defense forces are trying to get a hold of the situation, still not understanding what has happened.

As soon as the information gets out that it was a terrorist attack planned by Al Qaeda, whose mastermind is holed up in the Afghani mountains and is protected by the Taliban, the military men start volunteering immediately to go to war in Afghanistan in retaliation. Mitch Nelson (Hemsworth), a US Army Captain with Operational Detachment Alpha (ODA) 595, is moving into a new home with his wife and daughter on the date of the attack.

DESK JOB

Nelson had previously been assigned to staff (a desk job, following his promotion) duty under Lt Col Bowers (Riggle) but volunteers to lead ODA 595 into Afghanistan. CWO5 Spencer (Shannon) was scheduled to retire but volunteers for an additional deployment. After leaving their families, ODA 595 travels to Uzbekistan on October 7, 2001.

There, they are given a brief by 5th Special Forces Group Commander, Col. Mullholland (Fichtner), and the ODA 595 is selected to fight alongside

the Northern Alliance leader, Abdul Rashid Dostum.

ASPIRATIONS OF GOING BACK HOME

After covertly traveling aboard an MH-47 Chinook, ODA 595 arrives 30 miles south of Mazar-i Sharif (the fourth largest city of Afghanistan), and meets Dostum.

Six of the 12 members, led by Nelson, leave with Dostum to the mountains, while the other six remain in a fortified camp nicknamed The Alamo.

Dostum is attempting to capture Mazar-i Sharif, a critical city in northern Afghanistan, from the Taliban. The movie takes us somewhat through the minds of the natives and their crucial role of assisting in the victory against the Taliban.

We see a glimpse of how things were under this brutal regime that claimed to implement Sharia law on its citizens oppressively, and how these 12 – along with the local fighters and air support – fought for 23 days to gain control of this city.

Director Nicolai Fuglsig and writers Ted Tally and Peter Craig really did good work in not just making this typically a movie about war and revenge, but taking us deeper into what the personalities of every characters were.

The soldiers are people with families and have aspirations of going back home after the war.

The Afghanis fighting alongside the Americans are also people who just their children to be able to grow up in a country that they can be able to live their dreams without being told what they can only be, especially in regards to their daughters.

The action is also very good and the acting was on point; there are a lot of suspense points and humour in it.

Of course there was creative license a little bit in how some things were depicted but as a whole the movie came out wonderfully executed.

It is a gripping movie that anyone can watch and enjoy.