VALIANT ONE

Name: VALIANT ONE
Item: VALIANT ONE
Author: Review

"Crackling Good Redemptive, Patriotic Military Thriller"

Content: -2 Extreme caution for older teenagers and adults.

Entertainment Quality:

	None	Light	Moderate	Heavy
Language
Violence
Sex
Nudity

Credits →

What You Need To Know:

VALIANT ONE is an exciting, crackling military thriller. There are few places on Earth more terrifying for US soldiers to crash land in than the communist totalitarian state of North Korea. In VALIANT ONE, a US Army helicopter crew flying over the North-South Korean Demilitarized Zone crash lands deep inside North Korean territory during a powerful windstorm. A young soldier named Edward is thrust into the responsibility of leading the surviving soldiers and a civilian tech expert through a forest to the distant evacuation point. All the while, they must evade and battle enemy soldiers. They come across a North Korean family, but can they trust them?

VALIANT ONE doesn’t have big-budget explosions and effects, but it makes the most of its gun battles and suspenseful tension, as well as the cast’s strong performances. It has a highly patriotic, pro-American worldview and a powerful Christian prayer sequence in a scene of heroic self-sacrifice. VALIANT ONE is an entertaining action movie for older teenagers and adults. However, MOVIEGUIDE® advises extreme caution due to the movie’s frequent foul language and strong violence.

Content:

(CC, PPP, ACACAC, LLL, VV, M):

Dominant Worldview and Other Worldview Content/Elements:

Strong Christian worldview with highly Pro-American, patriotic content where heroic US soldiers battle communist North Korean soldiers as they try to make an escape from that totalitarian nation, movie promotes American pride, teamwork and self-sacrifice for others while also helping a young girl escape to freedom with them as well, plus an officer strongly prays the Lord’s Prayer before setting off a grenade to kill enemy soldiers, but marred by lots of strong foul language;

Foul Language:

About 51 “f” words, 13 “s” words, four other obscenities, one use of the name of Jesus, two GD profanities, and one OG profanity;

Violence:

Strong violence includes a few US soldiers are mortally wounded after a helicopter crash, with pools of blood pouring out and bloody facial cuts, frequent and numerous gun battles with several people being killed as a result, but these are mostly bloodless or with minimal blood, and there’s a nerve-wracking shouting match between US soldiers and a North Korean family they’re not sure they can trust.

Sex:

No sex;

Nudity:

No nudity;

Alcohol Use:

No alcohol use;

Smoking and/or Drug Use and Abuse:

No smoking or drugs; and,

Miscellaneous Immorality:

Some arguments between US soldier and a civilian who disagrees with their escape plan, but no violence in these.

More Detail:

There are few places on Earth more terrifying for US soldiers to crash land in than the enemy state of North Korea, and VALIANT ONE is a crackling thriller about how a small band of troops suffers that dilemma and boldly races to escape. The movie offers nearly non-stop action and solid performances that overcome its low-budget limitations, while maintaining a strongly Patriotic worldview and a strong Christian prayer scene that are nonetheless marred by frequent foul language and violence.

Edward (Chase Stokes) is a regular soldier who finds himself thrust into leadership after his U.S. Army helicopter crew crashes deep within Communist territory after wind shears from a storm bring a sudden end to a radar unit repair in the Demilitarized Zone between North and South Korea. The team’s commanding officer Chris Lebold (Callan Mulvey) is severely injured in the crash and orders Edward to lead the other survivors to safety.

Together with Asian-America soldiers Stephanie (Lana Condor) and Wilson (Daniel Jun), Edward has to also protect civilian tech specialist Josh (Desmin Borges), whose constant fear provides some comic relief but also repeatedly places them in danger. Josh keeps asking them to just surrender and let the US government negotiate them out, but the soldiers know that this is dangerous folly.

Thus begins the exciting quest to make it to the nearest possible evacuation site, traveling far through a forest while evading North Korean aircraft search teams and battling enemy soldiers at seemingly every turn. An especially harrowing sequence occurs when the US troops seek to take shelter in a building on a rural farm, only to be confronted angrily by a farmer with a shotgun and a battle of nerves as they try to figure out if more danger awaits inside his home, or if he might actually help them.

Can the American soldiers survive the adventure and make it to freedom?

VALIANT ONE stars largely unknown actors who have made their careers in television, but the fact that viewers aren’t rooting for major movie stars actually adds to the tension since it’s not as obvious who will make it through to safety. Writer-Director Steve Barnett keeps the storyline a model of fast-moving efficiency as it barrels through its tight 86 minute running time. However, he also draws strong performances during a few quieter moments of revelation.

The shootouts are so sharply designed that several moments will likely elicit surprised gasps from the audience. There’s also a fantastic scene of self-sacrifice that has a powerful rendition of the Lord’s Prayer.

Yet, the movie is hindered by its generic locations that could have been shot anywhere, which at times detracts from VALIANT ONE’s believability. Also, the movie’s confrontation with the farmer and his shotgun is exciting, but it’s completely off-base because the totalitarian North Korean state strictly bars gun ownership.

Sadly, VALIANT ONE features lots of obscenities and a few profanities, but the violence is kept to a superhero-movie level of mostly bloodless action. Overall, VALIANT ONE serves up a highly enjoyable thrill ride that older teenagers and adults can enjoy, although with extreme caution because of all the movie’s strong foul language.