Whether you get much out of this or not depends on what you're looking for. It's John Milius' film and he leaves his imprint on it. He's a weapons enthusiast. On some of his films he had it written into his contract that he would be allowed to hunt all the wild animals that were to be killed during the production. He's appeared on "Tales of the Gun" and displayed his expertise.I appreciate that. I don't mean it critically because I'm curious about weapons technology too, and I'm happy to see that the U. S. troops in the Spanish-American war don't use Winchester carbines but dysfunctional Krag-Jorgensens, compared to the superior Spanish Mausers.Yet the rendering of the battles in Cuba that featured Colonel Theodore Roosevelt are overdone to a turn. BANG. BOOM! The troopers do one of two things: fight or linger over someone's dying body during an exchange of manly sentiments. Tom Berenger's Theodor Roosevelt is outlandishly exaggerated. The dialog runs unchallengingly alone lines like, "By God, Sir, you are a cad!" At the height of a pitched battle, someone grabs a heavy machine gun and while mowing down the enemy he shouts out lines from Shakespeare's Henry V -- "Once more unto the breach!", and so forth.I couldn't stand it. It reminded me of the comic books I'd read as a child.Yet, I applaud it for its informative value. After all, who knows anything about the Spanish-American War, which has justly disappeared down the memory hole along with other mistakes like the War of 1812 and the Mexican-American War. And it is nice to see a movie directed by someone who cares a little about the historical accuracy of the technological details.

Although clearly the most historically accurate and interesting film on this subject made thus far, there were some liberties taken.Henry Nash and his "compadre" are fictional characters but are very helpful in moving the plot along. The same is true of Chris Noth's character, Craig Wadsworth.Bucky O'Neil, properly spelled "Buckey O'Neill", was a real and important person both in, and before the battle. One of the most important people in the history of Arizona, he was actually buried at Arlington National Cemetery with full honors.William Tiffany died, probably of malaria, while awaiting transport from Cuba. He was not fatally injured in the battle.The Marshall character portrayed by William Katt is, most likely,a composite of correspondent Richard Harding Davis (1864-1916) and correspondent/photographer James H. "Jimmy" Hare (1856-1946). Both obviously survived the battle and become well known newsmen.

On the 99th anniversary of the Spanish American war and the most famous land battle of that brief said war, John Millius wrote and directed a stirring tribute to the First Volunteer Cavalry. The group has come down to us in history as the Rough Riders and its organizer and second commander became President of the United States on the strength of one afternoon's very bloody work at a place called Kettle Hill, better known as San Juan Hill.Tom Berenger makes a splendid Theodore Roosevelt. He captures all the passion in him, the brilliance as well as the bumptiousness. Some may find Roosevelt too super-patriotic, even too racist in some regards. It was a different time a century ago. Roosevelt was also a man who would stand for nothing less than the United States being nothing less than number one.In his own way he pioneered integration, he was of the patrician class with roots going all the way back to Dutch New Amsterdam. But his Rough Riders as you see come from all walks of life, from society kids to even western outlaws.Milius did his research well for the most part. Ileane Douglas whose family pedigree includes grandparents Melvyn and Helen Gahagan Douglas, plays the ever patient Edith Kermit Carow Roosevelt. She loves her husband, but is able to say an occasional 'now Theodore' to put the brakes on his enthusiasm getting the better of him. Rough Riders marks the farewell performance of Brian Keith as President William McKinley who Roosevelt said had the back of a 'chocolate éclair'. That was one of Roosevelt not so admirable qualities, his failure to see merit the other point of view had. McKinley was a wounded Civil War veteran who saw action as a young man in places like Antietam. He was not a man to rush lightly and foolhardily into a decision for war, knowing far more than TR at the time of what war can cost.My favorite in the film is Sam Elliott as Yavapai County, Arizona sheriff Bucky O'Neill who joined the Rough Riders and was in charge of molding them into a unit. This is definitely one of Elliott's finest moments on screen.The last Rough Rider died in 1975. I wish some of them had been around to see this fine film about a young America and what some of the best and brightest of that generation did. The politics behind the Spanish American War are debatable and dubious at best, but the heroism of our soldiers is unquestioned.

Tom Berenger is a superb actor, and I think his talent is often overlooked. He was funny, affecting, and ennobling in "Major League," a comedy about a misbegotten baseball team. He was chilling, on a knife's-edge (a one-man Hitchcock plot - no way to tell where he was, or what he might do, or what he knew... but no mistaking the motivation and emotion, either... indescribably human, he was) in "Betrayed." His performance there was such that one hated and feared him from the very start, but ended up praying that he would not be slain. I heard little about his effectiveness in either case. And yet, there was, of course, his screen-shattering performance as Sgt. Barnes in the brilliant, alligorical, and hard-hitting Oliver Stone production, "Platoon." He won plaudits for that one, and well-deserved ones.In this one,"Rough Riders," he is given a juicy, meat-filled slice of adolescent Americana, to play - an incorrigible and inimitable American hero, the irrepressible Theodore Roosevelt. Rather than restraining himself, or attempting to portray TR as - well, as an adult - Berenger seems to let his performance carry itself, unconsciously. He is as over-the-top as TR himself. This is, at all times, under a thin, barely-controlled layer of respectability, very similiar itself to the state in which TR himself seemed to be born. TR's life, much of the time, was a bouncy, swashbuckling melodrama - and Berenger plays all of this to the hilt, and with the necessary controlled-abandon. He might be critisized for over-acting if it wasn't for the plain fact that this is, in fact, the way TR behaved. And anyone who cares to witness Mr. Berenger's other performances (including his most recent roll, as a delightfully dour and cynical sheriff, on USA's "Peacemakers") can see, his sensitivity to the depth of the characters he plays is extraordinary - one can almost pity him, in this case, for choosing to play a man who himself embodied unbelievable melodrama.Suffice to say, the entire picture is worth watching, just to see bully old Teddy back again, alive and in the flesh, trying to start a war, and then trying to fight and win that war... Berenger brings it all to life, brilliantly. He shouts "bully!" with enthusiasm, he studiously prepares several pairs of spectacles for his expedition to Cuba, we see him trying to improve his piping, asthma-riddled voice, the better to command his soldiers - and, later, we see him fall quite out of his chair at the jest of a comrade, declaiming, "I was overcome with mirth!" Such scenes will overcome the viewer with mirth, as well - but a knowing mirth.Having said that, this film's best moment is near the beginning, and it involves Illeana Douglas, who plays Teddy's wife, Edith, with a healthy dash of long-suffering tolerance, as if she would leave the set if she could just quit loving the man she'd married. Her defense of the macho (but defenseless) TR in the face of the French is played off terrifically. She comes across as precisely what Edith herself, in fact, was - a woman who had long since resigned herself to the hell-for-leather forays of her headstrong husband... and she defends him with the ruthlessness of a woman who knows that no foreigner will ever understand the boundless Americanism (or worldy childishness) of her husband.This is not a brilliant film, but it is an entertaining one. The battle scenes are well done, but, aside from what I mentioned above, the real fun in the picture is in the "boot-camp" scenes. A well-cast and icily forbidding Sam Elliott, along with the silent, brooding threat-in-being of David Midthunder, makes these scenes more interesting than the typical military drill-sergeant fare. By the end of the training process, even those watching the movie are longing for the approval of the aloof and mysterious Midthunder - who, in a nicely balanced final scene, explains himself in a way that banishes mystery, conjures comradeship, and evokes sympathy.One other character commends attention here. Gary Busey plays the ancient Confederate General Joseph Wheeler - a hero of the Civil War (for the South, anyway). Like Berenger, his acting is sure to be termed overdone, excepting the reality that his character was, in fact, a hell-for-leather, horse-riding, Yankee-skewering madman... And there is great pleasure in the watching of Busey bringing this nutty semi-senile General to life. He demands assurances from the President, and we see him repeatedly mistake the Spanish, who we Americans were fighting in this war, for "Yankees." (In the end, the addled, overweight, and over-enthusiastic General settles upon the phrase "them Yankee Spaniards," when referring to the enemy...) It is a fun portrayal of a man whose time has past, but who refuses to acknowledge the fact. Busey's Wheeler is so wound up in the sound of the guns, that he loses all reason, becomes delirious, and yet, beneath it all, hangs inadvertantly to the vestiges of heroism. I think there is little choice but to root for the ill-guided but irresistable General. Having such a melodramatic icon on screen with a viviedly-created TR is almost too much fun to bear. There is humour and adventure enough for all, in this. In the end, I recommend this picture for the terrific performances of Tom Berenger and Illeana Douglas, as well as the historical accuracy of much of it. I have left out, in these comments, sympathetic and effective performances by Chris Noth and Holt McCallany, who help make the movie go, and serve to tie the audience into the volunteer soldier idiom. Francesco Quinn brings patriotism, duty, and honour to life - unexpectedly (at least, to Anglo-Americans who know nothing of Latin qualities) in the guise of a love-struck Latin-American. His character, I think, speaks the most towards what modern soldiers might say, that we "all fight for each other." Quinn elevates these platitudes into reality, as the film portrays him carrying out his values, making decisions according to a code he had initially resisted in the interests of staying with his sweetheart. I have also left out Brad Johnson, who's trite "bad-man who learns honour" roll is, nevertheless, well-played. I could write much more... alas, just watch it, and see. A lot of fun. And very, very well done.