The Assault

Gripping Dramatization of One of the Greatest Hostage Rescue Operations in History
Even if you didn't have any knowledge that the events depicted in the film "the Assault" were real, I think you could appreciate this movie as a very well-made action story. But the thing is...it really did happen the way the film showed it (albeit I'm sure with slight fictionalization to compress the story which unfolded over several days in an action packed 90 minutes). Islamic terrorists hijacked a French airliner in 1994 in Algeria, murdered three hostages, and threatened to kill the rest if their demands were not met. And French intelligence agencies came to the sickening conclusion that the terrorists didn't plan to bargain for the release of prisoners or for a ransom. Rather they planned to fly the fully fueled jetliner into Paris and crash it into the Eiffel Tower (an eerie foreshadowing of 9/11). Were it not for the elite French police commando unit storming the aircraft in Marseilles, there could have been a far, far worse tragedy.

<spoilers...although...

Voice-overs the only downside
I enjoyed the movie and am happy I purchased it. The only downside is that the movie has voice-overs in English that detract from the movie as a whole. Whether the character is French, Algerian, etc., they all have American sounding voices and the sound quality with the voice-overs is not what it should have been. If more care had been taken in putting an appropriate voice with each character, it would have made for much better viewing. Fortunately, in the set up section of the Main Menu you can play it using the French soundtrack with English subtitles. I want to thank the first reviewer of this film for cluing me in to that fact. I was so excited to watch the movie when I got it that I just popped it in my DVD player and started watching it. Watching it in French was much better.

That being said, I thought every aspect of the assault phase of the movie was incredibly filmed and is very intense. The attention given to events leading up to the assault was well done...

SOX THE FOX THROWS SOME ROCKS
This is the story on how France in 1994 was able to avoid their "9-11" tragedy. Unfortunately the lessons learned from this incident didn't prevent our 9-11 as some critics have claimed it should have done. This story is told from 3 points of view. One is from the action on the plane itself in the runway in Algeria. The second is told from the story of Thierry (Vincent Elbaz) the French GIG (SWAT team) leader. The third and most important is the story of Carole (Mélanie Bernier) an assistant in the foreign minister's office. She was the one who realized this was really a suicide mission and there was no negotiating with the GIA terrorist group. She oversteps her authority and steps on a few toes in order to prevent a take off. I believe her role was a bit of a dramatization, but it made the film watchable as we end up with a woman, who is given no credit, saving Paris from burning.

The story was good paced drama-thriller. The voice overs were no better than 1960...

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