Outside the Wire – Standard War Movie
Director: Mikael Hafstrom
Writer: Rowan Athale, Rob Yescombe (Screenplay)
Starring: Anthony Mackie, Damson Idris, Pilou Asbaek, Michael Kelly, Kristina Tonteri-Young, Brady Dowad, Henry Garrett
Plot: In the near future, a drone pilot sent into a war zone finds himself paired with a top-secret android officer on a mission to stop a nuclear attack.
Tagline – Defiant by design.
Runtime: 1 Hour 54 Minutes
There may be spoilers in the rest of the review
Story: Outside the Wire starts when Lieutenant Thomas Harp (Idris) a drone pilot goes against orders to hit a missile strike, which will see two marines killed, instead of being court marshalled, he is sent into combat in the Ukraine to work with Leo (Mackie) a top-secret android officer that has intelligence on the warlord leading the battle against Victor Koval (Asbaek) who is leading the war to take Ukraine back into Russia.
Working with Leo taking Harp on his mission, which will see him needing to go head to head with the warlord on a mission where Leo has put himself into a position where he is willing to help more than any human soldier could, teaching Harp the reason why he was redeployed here.
Thoughts on Outside the Wire
Characters & Performances – Lieutenant Thomas Harp is a drone pilot who has an excellent record until he goes against orders to try and save as many members as possible of a unit ends up seeing two marines killed, his punishment is to get sent to the ground to experience active combat under an android soldier, where he will get to see the effects of his work from the sky on the local population and learn the fight isn’t just on the computer screens. Damson Idris does a great job in this film. Captain Leo is an android that has been collecting intel for the military in the ongoing conflict between Russia and Ukraine, with the Americans trying to keep the peace, he shows Harp around, showing him the consequences of war, where he does end up learning more about what could be the right thing. Anthony Mackie in the leading role is the most entertaining part of the film, with his charisma being the part of the film which keeps everything flowing nicely. We get to meet a lot of military figures that all have their own opinion on Harp, which will show how he needs to prove himself to them, while also meeting the residents that are involved in the war, the warlord striking fear in the people.
Story – The story here follows a drone pilot whose mistake leaves him being sent to conflict zone to learn about the consequences of his action, only to find himself in the middle of a battle which could bring about the start of the next world war. This story does show us how war has been getting fought in different ways, without a soldier ever needing to leave his own country, while the ground will still have the same problems of consequences which will cause people to go in different directions with who to blame, we get to see how a man-made intelligence system will study the problem and look to see what the best solution would be to save more people.
Themes – Outside the Wire does bring us plenty of war action which will have plenty of cuts to chop up the action and not make anything as smooth as it could be, while the fights Leo gets involved in looks more like a superhero movie that an android fight, the settings do show us just how difficult the environment would be for the victims and we do get some great special effects, which include seeing the body Leo has, which is shocking to see first, but looks amazing.
Outside the Wire is a war movie that might well ask a bigger question, but gets caught up in the action, which has way too many fast cuts.