Every other review that I've done in these 'TV Watch' items has been about a television series, and so HBO's "Taking Chance" is the first movie-length program that has made the grade.
An official selection of the Sundance Film Festival, this true story is one of the most moving and emotional war films of all-time, yet it contains no more than a couple minutes of actual combat action. Instead, "Taking Chance" tells the story of two men who never meet in life, but whose paths cross in a most unusual and pivotal manner.
Kevin Bacon plays the starring role of United States Marine Colonel Michael Strobl who served his country well in Operation Desert Storm back in the early 1990's and who then drifted later in his career into an office-type desk job position. Strobl is now an analyst with the Department of Defense, and he struggles with his desk job role, particularly when he passes over an opportunity to serve in Iraq in order to remain home and close to his wife and two young children.
His struggle is that of a former warrior who still feels the call of the battlefield, and the responsibility that only those who have warn the uniform can know. That responsibility is not only for your country or municipality, as those in the military or in other uniformed service such as police officers know, but also to your fellow men and women in uniform.
