Awesome Movie

I wanted to like it more than I actually did... But much of the humor totally escaped me and I walked out only mildly impressed.

The film never slows down or bores, plunging from one harrowing sequence to the next.

It is a whirlwind of delight --- attractive actors, stunning couture, spectacular sets and outrageous parties.

This came with a fair bit of acclaim in the build up to its release . Upon its release it did very little. This shouldn't be seen as to a comment on its quality , more down to the fact that a lot of British films fail to attract a major distribution deal. There's possibly something else and that is by 2014 Afghanistan had become a forgotten . NATO had done its best to make a fractured failed state in to a secular democracy. It was a failure but a noble one. It was also a conflict that was often waged by the Taliban via roadside bombs and other booby traps. In other words it's not a conflict that'll lend itself to pitched "war porn" type battles by Hollywood studios. If nothing else any film featuring Afghanistan can't be any worse than the previous British effort THE PATROL from the year before Thankfully KAJAKI does nail the mentality of the modern volunteer soldier. Conscription ended in Britain in 1960 and no one was happier than the British military themselves . If you have a military composed of people who want to be there you've got a better military machine and it's good to see the rest of NATO adopt a voluntary military. From the outset KAJAKI nails this point very accurately with Tug saying he left the army after being disappointed by the lack of action he saw in Iraq and re-enlisted when Britain extended its mission in Afghanistan. Civilians in general and the anti-war brigade in particular constantly forget that young men join the army to see some heavy duty adventure. Indeed one of the legacies of the Afghan conflict was the phenomena of "The grief whore" who'd line the streets of Wootan Bssset every time they'd hear bodies of military personal were repatriated As it stands KAJAKI is a story of British courage. In some ways it's a stark , poignant metaphor for the NATO mission to Afghanistan . It shows the unbreakable bond between soldiers and a heroic courage most humans are unaware of. The downside is that "war is 99% boredom and 1% terror". There's a danger that if you're making a film based on fact then if you're embellishing a story then the truth becomes more and more diluted due to embellishment. I don't feel KAJAKI suffers from embellishment but at the same time there does seem to be something missing. I guess that's because I'm a civilian and death on the battlefield is something unknown to me ? At the end of the day the veterans are more qualified than me to comment on the conflict in Afghanistan and I'll look forward to reading their comments

Yes this is realistic and, yes it's based on a true story. But this just didn't work. We get an introduction to our characters with a lot of troop dialogue, some of it incomprehensible due to the accents. Anyway, after we see the settings and the stark mountainous scenery our soldiers go out on a patrol.They step into a minefield. One fellow lies screaming in agony, as we would expect. Then after an interlude another soldier steps on mine. At this stage, we know war is hell and soldiers fall into dire and hopeless situations. But it really becomes excruciating and repetitive – and it drags on for at least an hour. I started fast- forwarding and it was almost like the same scenes kept being repeated. It just became too much – the screaming, the blood, the gushing limbs, the tourniquets applied...

I found this movie quite silly, let me start out with the things that i really liked about this movie.-First, i absolutely loved the scenery, beautiful setting and well thought out location. -I like the authenticity of the accents. Yes, granted they where difficult to understand being such thick accents, however i felt that this really added to my enjoyment of the movie - I liked the characters, had some interesting characters each with their own individual traits. now the things i didn't like that made this movie quite silly.-the biggest thing that i found bothered me in this movie, is that it nearly entirely takes placed in a ravine-Landmines are the bad guy in the movie-SEND MORE PEOPLE INTO THE LANDMINE PIT, they didn't learn their lesson the first two times. -their non functioning radio is a major plot piece, and it doesn't really do anything other than cause frustration and more delay to the story.-soldiers lay there on the ground in the minefield and have lengthy conversations while waiting for either another land mine or help to arrive. these conversation moments are drawn out and quite boring. Overall, I would say that I still did somewhat enjoy this movie, but mostly for the scenery and the characters. If you really don't have anything better to watch then i would say give it a try, but otherwise you can give it a pass and you wont be missing much other than landmines.

Knowing the story beforehand I was curious to see how the makers of this film could come up with a well rounded movie.Unfortunately, they didn't. After a very short introduction to the main characters, all with strong British accents which even I had trouble understanding (British born Australian), we are taken to the minefield. Yes I jumped a couple of times, but then found there was no pace. There was too much unedited conversation and no action or tension.It is a shame that the film makers didn't provide more background, showing how tough you have to be, to be a British Paratrooper, and some of the previous actions they had been involved in leading up to the mines. This would have probably conveyed more the futility of being killed or wounded by Russian mines planted many years earlier. Just showing realistic portrayals of mine strikes does not a great movie make.