Battle Company: Korengal – Review

20th June 2014

Restrepo is an outpost in the Korengal Valley, named after a popular medic who was killed early in the stationing. Korengal Sequel of sorts to the exceptional Restrepo, the documentary of the same name, and Sebastian Junger has revisited the 2nd platoon.

These are films that aren’t about a battle or a mission or even a war. This is about a group of guys caught together in a tough situation, the stir craziness that ensues and the ways that it has to be overcome for the good of them all.

Both films are more about the experience of war instead of war itself. It avoids the graphic in favour of allowing these soldiers tell their personal feelings and experiences of this specific outpost and it makes no apologies for them.

They are given the forum to tell their story and describe to the uninitiated about what it’s like out in the field. This is not Call Of Duty irreverence or trying to politicise the 2nd platoon.

War docs are usually made of secondary sources, but this is as primary as it gets. You really feel that Junger was in the trenches with these guys, ducking and diving with them and not just looking at them.

It retains the fascinating close-ups of Restrepo, showing every blemish and scuff and scar that these men carry. What’s new is the abandonment of the overall vérité style in favour of a more mainstream style of documentary, including a score, quicker editing and heavier use of the talking head interviews. The honest and candid way they talk about their experiences and feelings is something that is hard to find anywhere else. Probably because most other films of this kind are trying to get a political point of view across.

Junger’s documentary pair is, perhaps, the definitive representation of the camaraderie, brotherhood and difficulties of being a soldier in the modern age, showing the struggle of men trying to hanging on to their humanity when being forced to lose it.

Available in certain cinemas now. For more information visit www.korengalthemovie.com

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