Favorite Directior

This assignment is interesting. In class, I spoke of a very deep personal attachment to the film, Black Hawk Down. I'm predisposed to not share this information and usually do not associate myself with it or indicate in any way that I'm connected. What I mean to say is it's not ever been on my list of favorites, partly because I have a stigma of being a military child so people kind of assume, oh duh, of course that's her favorite movie, when there is so much more behind it. I mean, I only wear a silver chain donning a charm with the insignia of this particular unit around my neck everyday no matter what. Of course, there is also the fact that one of the most powerful scenes displayed in the film is a framed mural waiting to be hung in my living room. I have a very quiet fondness of the film and am ever grateful for the work and beauty behind the final product. My dad once told me, back when I was way too young to be watching an R-rated film that this movie should be seen by every American. The extra features, you can see my carrot top bad ass neighbor in, just a glimpse but he's showing the actors how it's done. His Panamanian wife just became a U.S. citizen. I don't know how to talk about directors but I do know how to talk about the appreciation of a beautiful work, and that's what it is, the film is a beautiful work. The production had to be right, because it had to, and not because of backlash from the military community, but because it had to. The story was something much bigger. There's something about seeing a glimpse of your life onscreen that just paralyzes you.

You know, my dad has another saying, and I feel dirty even typing this and I will probably delete this post some day down the road...
"People say that America doesn't have royalty? Well, they have never met a Delta widow.."
That's the point here, movies and directors are suppose to make parallels that speak to you, that open a door into your life or your imagination for an hour and forty minutes, well this movie opens every door and window and basically knocks the whole foundation of my wheelhouse, it is an all the way full blown vulnerability that reminds me who I am in every frame.
I run a blog about military brat culture/ lifestyle, and I have a post sitting in my drafts, it was one of the first posts I wrote, its about how if someone ever wanted to know me, my future husband, my cousins, my best friend, they would need to watch this movie. In fact, I described it as a criteria of my future husband: must have seen Black Hawk Down. I never posted it and I battled with the idea of what I could share and not share on the blog, one of the conclusions I made was that very few would understand and then my boyfriend saw Black Hawk Down and told me that he didn't care for it, there was too much fighting and those scenes kind of took over the whole movie. I wanted to give him the silent treatment for a year, but then I remembered that some people really won't get it and I couldn't get angry about it. Instead, I would keep it to myself, burrow it in one of the safest softest strongest parts of my heart.


"On the last day of their week-long Army Ranger orientation at Fort Benning, the actors who played the Rangers received a letter that had been anonymously slipped under their door. The letter thanked them for all their hard work, and asked them to "tell our story true", signed with the names of the Rangers who died in the Mogadishu firefight."
(IMDb)

"The sequence of events near the end of the movie, where some of the US Rangers were forced to run, unprotected, behind the rescue convoy, did indeed happen. This unfortunate turn of events was named by the soldiers after the battle as "The Mogadishu Mile". (IMDb)

"The film features soldiers wearing helmets with their last names on them. Although this was an inaccuracy, Ridley Scott felt it was necessary to have the helmets to help the audience to distinguish between the characters because they all look the same once the uniforms are on." (IMDb)



"Some of the scenes on the monitors behind Maj. Gen. Garrison are actual satellite images of the battle." (IMDb)

"None of the film was made in Somalia but in the similar looking cities of Rabat and Sale in Morocco. No Somali actors are included in the cast. Somalia was at the time, as it is today, a dangerous and unstable country. " (IMDb)

"Forty of the actors who were playing Rangers were sent to Fort Benning, GA, to attend a two-week crash course in becoming Rangers. Fifteen actors playing Delta Force members were sent to Ft. Bragg, NC, and were given a two-week Commando Course by members of the 1st Special Warfare Training Group. Ron Eldard went to Fort Campbell, KY, and was given a lecture by several Little Bird and Black Hawk pilots, including Mike Durant, about flying and the battle." (IMDb)

"All Black Hawks and Little Birds used during the filming were from the 160th SOAR (Special Operations Aviation Regiment) and most of the pilots were involved in the actual battle on 3-4 October 1993. A lot of the Army Rangers in the film were actual Rangers, serving with the 3/75 Ranger Regiment." (IMDb)

"In order to keep the film at a manageable length, 100 key characters in the book were condensed down to 39." (IMDb)

"There was no effort made to cast actors who looked like their real-life counterparts." (IMDb)

"According to American Sniper Chris Kyle this film is shown to US Navy special forces recruits to inspire them before they begin the 'Hell Week' stage of their SEAL training." (IMDb)


"One of the favorite films of George W. Bush." (IMDb)



....my closing remarks are...
That is how you make a movie, Ridley Scott. Take notes everybody.