Salvador

Pros: Outstanding performances from Woods and Belushi, excellent camera work and cinematography, stellar direction.
Cons: Some parts are a little too graphic, ending has a somewhat campy feel

Anyone who has seen an Oliver Stone picture in the last two decades, has a fairly rough idea of this man's image and style. Raw, gritty, and uncompromisingly clear in his portrayal of human suffering, Stone is to many a film god. What's surprising is the...

Pros: Delivers an uncompromising message, James Woods' performance
Cons: defeatist, excessive, confrontational, predictable.

Oliver Stone's Salvador is a film that in many ways represents what a politically turbulent time the 1980's was, and just how radical and daring cinema could be back then. Salvador is a view of the 1980-81 period in El Savador seen from the fictional ...

Pros: incredible Gonzo performance from Woods, breathtaking pace, unrelenting point of view and style.
Cons: Just an awful preachy 10 minute stretch toward the end of the film.

It's flawed and nearly self-destructs, but remains a harrowing, powerful, in your face testosterone fueled film with some fine performances. It's Stone's best film.

Oliver Stone got into the car and pressed hard on the gas pedal. He doesn't...

Pros: great blending of fact with fiction
Cons: they exist, but can't think of any offhand

This is THE Oliver Stone film for people who don't like Oliver Stone films. Released in 1985 (while the war between the FMLN and the Bureaucratic-Authoritarian government was still going full speed), the legacy of "Salvador" is that it opened America's...

Pros: Stone's Developing Narrative Power
Cons: Sometimes Makes War a Little too Funny

When I first saw Salvador, way back in 1986, I didn't know who Oliver Stone was, but I knew I loved this movie. In fact, I went back and saw it, at the Quad Cinema, three times. The movie, featuring the John Belushi character's opening tirade against...

Pros: good war movie
Cons: badly portrays culture of El Salvador

Like anything else, this movie has both good and bad qualities. If you are looking for a good war movie, then this is a good choice. It does have plenty of bloody and gruesome scenes. These scenes are aided by the fact that there are some humorous scenes...