Apocalypse Now has the big movie stars. Platoon has the budget. Full Metal Jacket has Kubrick. But Forgotten Heroes has the truth. And when history does what history always does best and shakes itself loose of the blistering lies told of and about America's involvement in Vietnam, it will be Jack Marino's Forgotten Heroes that's first acquitted.
Watching the history of Vietnam through the eyes of mainstream Hollywood you'd never know our goal was to help a people retain their self-determination. You'd never know that what the critics wrist-flicked as a civil war was in fact a national act of fratricide; one brother trying to oppress and butcher another. You'd never know the consequence of our leaving -- our breaking our promise to our allies -- our caving to the anti-war left -- was a holocaust of millions. And you'd never know that our men and women over there were honorable, self- sacrificing, heroes. You'd never know this because in order to present its twisted view of the war mainstream Hollywood must demonize our troops. It must lie.
In Forgotten Heroes we finally see an honest portrayal of these good and decent men who left their homes and risked their lives for something bigger than themselves. Marino's film reminds us how that once meant something. Marino's film also reminds us that when those men are forgotten by a government unwilling to finish what it started, the price they pay doesn't end with the war.
Using relatively unknown actors and a meager budget, Marino expertly mixes themes larger than politics with a briskly paced emotional story and action scenes that defy that meager budget. And watching Forgotten Heroes is a reminder of just how far Hollywood has fallen.
There was a time Hollywood believed in spreading liberty and stopping tyranny. There was a time it marshaled every force at its disposal because it believed everyone, regardless of skin color or religion, deserved freedom. That belief died sometime in the late 1960's. And from it sprang an ideology of anti-Americanism and pro-Communism that has infested our films for forty years and lives on today in the form of Michael Moore, Oliver Stone, and all the others who find the tyrants Castro and Saddam more tolerable than our own President.
But that's just politics. We can disagree on politics. But what about the men? Why must the heroes of Vietnam be slandered in film after film to support the misguided political agendas of the Hollywood left? Can't we draw a line of decency somewhere?
Well, Marino has drawn a line. He put his money and talent and reputation on the line to tell the truth about these men. And for over fifteen years he's shown this film to anyone willing to listen. Anyone with enough of an open mind to consider that there are still stories left untold in Vietnam. Stories of heroism and sacrifice. In other words: The Truth.
Every viewing of Forgotten Heroes makes these heroes less forgotten. Every viewing jabs a finger in the eye of a Hollywood that lies about them. The forgotten heroes of Vietnam have a friend in Jack Marino. And so do maverick filmmakers everywhere with a dream. With a love of country. With a love of freedom. With a love of truth. - John Nolte
