Prominent Hollywood conservative Lionel Chetwynd made his bones, so to speak, with this gripping but flawed 1987 drama about Vietnam War POWs held in Hanoi's notorious Hoa Lo Prison. An ideologically skewed (almost defiantly so) take on prison-camp pictures, The Hanoi Hilton injects plenty of hindsight observations along with right-wing potshots at impotent American policymakers of the Vietnam era. Michael Moriarty heads the cast (which includes Paul Le Mat, Jeffrey Jones, and Stephen Davies) as a Yankee prisoner thrust into a position of authority when his commanding officer (Lawrence Pressman) is taken off to be tortured. Various segments are devoted to freshly arrived prisoners, with Chetwynd remaining focused throughout on the Americans' determination to survive in the face of almost subhuman treatment by their captors. Unfortunately, this singleness of purpose nearly derails the film (a few subplots could have fleshed out the characters and given viewers much-needed breathing space between atrocities). At the time of its theatrical release, The Hanoi Hilton reflected the Reagan-era surge in patriotism, but 20 years later it doesn't really hold up. DVD extras include a recent interview of former Hanoi Hilton POW John McCain by Chetwynd. Not a necessary purchase. (E. Hulse)
The Hanoi Hilton
Warner, 126 min., R, DVD: $19.98 Volume 24, Issue 1
The Hanoi Hilton
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