I just recently re-watched this after forgetting why I had shunned it on late night cable all these years. There is a lot of great stuff in this movie, it has a good director, a great cast- Nick Cage , Mark Ruffalo and Peter Stormare three of my faves, and the acting isn't that bad. The movie has good historically interesting subject material and the screenplay is not terrible. Yet this flick, while still fun to watch at 3AM, is a horrendous train wreck. First and foremost of its flaws is the sound. The musical score is just flat out awful. It's misplaced and overbearing. Imagine trying to watch Saving Private Ryan with The A-Team theme playing incessantly and you get the idea. Also the whole sound editing of the battles is hugely off, WWII was a battle of big guns and here it sounds like a Sunday Civil War re-enactment. Adding insult to injury, while the battle scene choreography is visually excellent, it looks as realistic as a M.A.S.H. episode because of the location. Like M.A.S.H. it's just obviously filmed in America. Sorry but my suspension of disbelief just can't be stretched into believing the well manicured landscapes of Hawaii and Southern California were the battlegrounds of WWII. The final nail in the coffin is that all the naval battle scenes are obvious stock footage. Stock Footage! Need I say more?

Windtalkers is by far the most inaccurate and unrealistic war movie I've ever had the displeasure of seeing. I was a fan of the film growing up, as explosions generally attract young boys. Now that I've matured it's painfully obvious how generic it is. The acting is sub par for a war movie, the genuine emotions of war are vacant in this film. The amount of explosions almost make me think Michael Bay was really behind this film, using John Woo as an alias. Nic Cage is a one man army, which is truly the most irritating part of it all. His character is equipped with an M1A1 Thompson SMG. The Thompson holds 20 rounds a magazine, yet I don't believe I saw Cage reload a single time. Besides his infinite magazine and ammunition, he single handedly kills dozens upon dozens of the enemy, which makes the rest of his squad appear utterly useless. Adam Beach gives a rather a dry performance, which further proves my theory that he's nothing but a mediocre Michael Pena. How he landed a role in Flags of Our Fathers, a war film light years ahead of Windtalkers, is beyond me. In one of the final scenes, where Nic Cages character (Enders) dies, I couldn't decide which actor was less believable. For your closest companion on the battlefield sacrificing his life for yours, you'd think he'd have a little more emotion as he says goodbye. Two dull leading actors severely hurt the more dramatic scenes. This film is a textbook example of clichés, predictable outcomes, crucial scenes ruined by mediocre acting, and so much more. The only reason I rated it a generous 4/10 was for the entertainment factor. If you discard historical content and the near insulting portrayal of war, the impressive (although sometimes overdone) amount of explosions and the abundance of extras can result in some very attractive shots. The bottom line is this movie is a very poorly done film in regards to the war genre, but as far as action goes its enough to keep you entertained. If you're a history buff like I am, you'll want to rip your hair out in the first fifteen minutes. If you're just looking for a solid action movie, this might just be enough.

I had heard about the Code Talkers and understood their efforts were important to winning World War II. I found the idea of watching a movie about their efforts interesting.I didn't really understand how Nicolas Cage getting in a jam in the Solomon Islands and acting heroically contributed to that, but I kept watching. Eventually, I made the connection. His flawed and damaged character was being put in charge of keeping a Code Talker safe. I hadn't considered the possibility of a Code Talker being put in a combat situation, and yet this movie made clear how vital their efforts were even on the battlefield. We also got to see how risky it was to be a Code Talker in this situation, since the Japanese somehow knew about these people and would find them valuable. Yes, the possibility of the code being revealed to the enemy has a tragic consequence. Many hard decisions were made here.Although I wasn't really prepared for battle and didn't like the violence that went with it, combat scenes were effectively done. Nicolas Cage, of course, is a Rambo or Schwarznegger which is good for movie audiences if not necessarily realistic. The relationships that develop between fighting men made the movie interesting.Adam Beach did a fine job and was quite likable. Whether he looked like an Indian or not, and whether he really looked Japanese (which became important in one scene), didn't matter to me. I went with my neighbors to the Cherokee reservation in North Carolina a few years ago and the campaign billboards, during a race for chief, showed a man who could have passed for white. Actually, Beach looked more like the other type of Indian. But the important thing was his character's pride in his heritage, and the scenes that showed his culture, particularly with his friend Charlie Whitehorse. The scenery in the American West is great. And the areas where combat took place also are nice to look at.I was impressed that one of the military bases somehow got a 50-star flag more than 15 years before there were actually 50 states. I wonder when that flag was developed? Still, a regular 48-star flag would have been better for consistency.If the objective was to tell people this film was about Code Talkers and to focus on a flawed but heroic white marine and show the Code Talkers' battlefield actions as a supplement to the main plot, then I believe the goal was achieved.

I had been looking forward to watching this movie, but boy was I disappointed. I thought the subject was very interesting so I forgot to check the reviews of the movie. It could have been a great movie under other circumstances. Unfortunately I didn't know about action film director and producer John Woo, had I known about him I would have been more wary. What a waste of more than 2 hours! We only hear small fragments of the story about the Navajo code-talkers, most of the movie is wasted on long scenes with shooting and violence that has nothing to do with what should have been the main part of the movie: the story of the code-talkers. I feel snubbed, it could have become a great movie. But then they had to waste the opportunity and end up with more than 2 hours of unbelievable crap: long scenes with guns blazing and hardly no mention of what should have been the main theme: the Navajo code-talkers.I am so disappointed, I hope that some day there will be a film that really tell the story of the code-talkers.