The billing for "Tank" is right on the mark. It is an action, drama and comedy film, with some serious overtones. Although rated PG, it's most appropriate for mature adults. In other words, those who don't get too much glee out of the treatment of prisoners on the county work farm, and those who think the allusions and references to being beaten to death, gang-raped and killed are really that funny. It's not for kids at all – with just enough nudity, foul language and discussion of prostitution, adultery, etc. to go along with the violent aspects. The film also is a look at Army life during peacetime. The film came out in 1984, so it takes place around then. Sgt. Maj. Zack Carey (James Garner) has been in the Army 30 years. Both he and Maj. Gen. Hubik (Sandy Ward) have rows of ribbons on their chest. Both also have senior parachutist badges and Ranger patches, as well as Combat Infantry Badges (CIB). They would have entered the service after Korea and probably had considerable combat time in Vietnam. Zack appears to have nine hash marks on his sleeve – which would represent four and one- half years in combat zones. The IMDb film summary describes the plot in enough detail. The cast are all very good in their parts. Besides those mentioned above, Shirley Jones is good as Zack's'wife, LaDonna; C. Thoms Howell if very good as son, Billy; Jenilee Harrison as the local hooker, Sarah; James Cromwell is the doormat and abusive deputy Euclid; Dorian Harewood is very good as Sgt. Tippett; and G.D. Spradlin is excellent as Sheriff Buelton. "Tank" seems to have capitalized on the popularity of the long- running TV series, "The Dukes of Hazzard," which was set in the South. This film has more bite and sarcasm about the corrupt and dictatorial local law found in some places, but it is a lot of fun for mature audiences. We root for Sgt. Major Zack as he demolishes Sheriff Buelton's office and jail and makes his escape across the northern Georgia county to the Tennessee state line. The film takes pokes at the military and local southern communities that host military bases – mostly the latter. It jabs Bible-thumping law enforcement and hypocrites, especially those often characterized as being in the South. The setting for the film is a fictitious Army base, Fort Clemmons. It's located in Georgia, supposedly in the NW not far from the Tennessee border. Anyone familiar with that part of the country would know how hilly and high it can get. That's at the end of the Blue Ridge Mountains on the borders of Virginia, West Virginia, Kentucky, North Carolina and Tennessee. The opening scene shows vehicles driving through flat tree-covered country. That's the type of country around Ft. Benning, GA, much further south, which is also where most of the Army base scenes were shot. Ft. Benning has been the home of the U.S. Infantry since 1918, and has several specialty training centers and schools there. Among them are the Airborne (parachutist) and Ranger schools, Officer Candidate School (OCS), the Infantry school and others. Since 2005, it has been home of the Armor School, which moved from Fort Knox, KY. And, since that year, Ft. Benning has been designated the U.S. Army Maneuver Center of Excellence. The film shows the 114th Infantry Division at the fictitious base. There hasn't been such a division in the U.S. Army, although there has been a 114th Inf. Regiment Military families, those with such backgrounds and anyone interested in the military and war films should enjoy this film.

Not only does Tank offer varied assortments in the ways of wit, action, and humor, I believe that it also accurate portrays the periodic levels of corruption that previously and continue to plague the various small town, white-bred trailer trash communities across the nation, moreover a mild example of which I can personally relate to.Two years ago, a similar rural community with it's own breed of laws and regulations attempted to suspend my driving privileges upon ticketing a driver for speeding that had confiscated a driver's license that I had previously reported as stolen. My attempts to explain myself only proved a fruitless endeavor, as the community encouraged me to pay up and get over it. Only after I hired an attorney and threatened a lawsuit, did the grit munching scum-suckers in question withdraw their insistence.Within this film, a corrupt southern bred police department attempts to enslave an Army Major's son after a deputy is justifiable beaten up in retaliation to assaulting a falsely branded "prostitute". As a portion of cover, the malevolent Sheriff runs a broadly defined farm that actually qualifies as a labor camp from which to subject luckless youths to intensive brutality. After failed attempts to appease the Sheriff's fury, James Garner elects to take matters into his own hands, commandeering a personally owned Sherman Tank in which to spring his son, and demolish a few of the corrupt police department's facilities along the way.Perhaps another reason I enjoyed this movie is the presence of the highly versatile score by the incomparable Lalo Schifrin, who employs every compositional style in the book from Jazz to traditional military marches and a highly catchy disco tune. Unfortunately, the latter becomes a subject of unwarranted contempt from the Sergeant major's redneck upbringing, as he encourages local bars to refit their repertroire to stay any unwanted coersions to "dance the funky monkey".Overall, the film offers a highly sympathetic premise, that eerily enough seems completely plausible in today's terms, given the prevalence of small towns, isolated from the civilized world and thus prone to erect their own dictatorial policies, no matter how severe.

It's as though they switched genres in the middle of the movie from drama to comedy. There's a good beginning building Zack as a tough as nails Master Sargent who is a stand up guy. Standing up for what's right in a corrupt town, including the Mayor and Police, gets him into trouble with the locals. When the mayor finds he can't touch Zack, he goes after his son, sending him to a brutal work camp on trumped up drug charges. Zack goes off in his tank to free his son and somewhere after the breakout the movie falls apart. Prior to this point, it seems there was no attempt to get a laugh, now, every cliché in the book is worked in at the cost of any pretense of seriousness

***SPOILERS - LIKE I'M REALLY GONNA RUIN IT FOR YA!***When I first started seeing posters for this film in the movie theatres, I thought all my dreams had come true. A movie about a tank! ALL about a tank! It'll crush cars and blow things up!I went into the theatre on opening night expecting just that, and that's just what I got. At nine years of age, plot and acting didn't mean a whole lot to me - not when a Sherman tank was running over cop cars, anyway.Now, I can see this film for what it is: a paper-thin plot, mostly-wooden acting (Except for G.D. Spradlin chewing the scenery), and plot holes you could, well, drive a tank through. But what the hell? It's a fun little movie, with plenty of tankish action to keep armor enthusiasts like me interested, even if the rest of the story IS so stupid it makes me want to retch.