Rescue Dawn Movie Review

World renowned film director Werner Herzog is one of the most unique voices in the history of film. His work mainly focuses on obsessed characters with a bit of madness inside of them (some claim that is very similar to the director himself). Rescue Dawn is Herzog's second film on a German-American fighter pilot named Dieter Dengler. In 1997 he directed the documentary Little Dieter Needs to Fly about Dengler and retraced the pilot's steps as he recounted how he was captured and tortured by Vietnamese soldiers. Now, Herzog fictionalizes the account and uses Christian Bale as Dieter. He has made better films than Rescue Dawn, but not many others have.

The story begins with a Navy debriefing about a secret attack on Laos. As Dieter flies overhead, dropping missiles, he is shot down and crashes in an open field. Herzog does something interesting in this scene because he uses little to no soundtrack music. Instead we just hear the plane crashing and Dieter beginning to run. It is important because it sets the tone for the rest of the movie. Herzog is not going to use superficial tactics that tug at the audiences emotions, but will show us an interesting story about a man's struggle to regain his freedom.

After escaping a group of Vietnamese that chase Dieter into a forest, he manages to stay in hiding for a day, but is found the next day while trying to flag down an over-passing helicopter. We then follow Dengler as he is tortured in horrifying ways. At one point he is strapped down by his arms and legs as a child holds a huge bug over his face. Later, he is hung upside down with an ants nest fastened to his head, then taken down, only to be placed in a small well with water up to his eyes.