Actuakers One of my all time favorites.

Roman Sampson One of the most extraordinary films you will see this year. Take that as you want.

Erica Derrick By the time the dramatic fireworks start popping off, each one feels earned.

Zandra The movie turns out to be a little better than the average. Starting from a romantic formula often seen in the cinema, it ends in the most predictable (and somewhat bland) way.

pimy95 Low budget and looks more like a TV movie then major motion picture, partially financed by the political conscious star.One of the first Vietnam war movies to come out after the end of the conflict. Therefore had difficulties with funding and not well received in theaters when it came out. We had, had enough about Vietnam.However, very accurate in portrayal of early war, yes including the firearms used. The corruption in the south Vietnamese military, The US walking right into the same places as the French, and not fighting WW2 again. The population, at war with each other and us in the middle, and the effectiveness of "female" Vietcong soldiers, here portrayed by the actress that just a few years later would go on to play "Kwang Lee", on the TV series "Night Court". Yes a pleasant surprise of a film, that tried to tell a story people didn't want to hear yet, when it came out.

dougdoepke A small group of American military advisors and their Vietnamese allies try to defend an abandoned village from Viet Cong attack.It's a difficult movie to parse since the focus remains somewhat fuzzy. But that's probably just as well since the war itself remains fuzzy for many Americans. The enemy wore no uniforms, held no ground, and melted away after engagement. In short, it was a long way from the kind of war Americans were used to fighting, an example of what I believe they now call "asymmetrical" warfare. Here, it's 1964 and our level of engagement remains as advisors only. Big troop landings are still a year away. In the movie, we're introduced to the men of Major Barker's (Lancaster) small advisory command and why they've volunteered for hazardous duty. These range from selfless idealism to career opportunities to the one draftee. What they all lack, including the major, is any understanding of the country or culture they're fighting in. Instead, they depend upon their brutal Asian interpreter, Cowboy! Trouble is he's fighting a personal war against the Cong and cares little whether he's advancing the broader cause. Note that the film makes little or no mention of the politics swirling around our intervention. For the individual soldier, these larger issues may seem too abstract or simply reducible to evils of communist aggression. But either way, they're left to higher-ups. Nonetheless, it's the politics of national liberation from decades of Western occupation that drive the Viet Cong, ultimately galvanizing the ordinary peasant into joining. In terms of the movie, it's what's not really mentioned that's so important, rather than what is. And for the Americans, the bottom line is duty, not national liberation. Thus the apt comparison with the dutiful dead Spartans rings true. All in all, it's a tricky film that may or may not be the best on that bloody misadventure. But it does dramatize a serious level of disconnect.

bkoganbing In a recent biography of Burt Lancaster, Go Tell The Spartans is described as the best Vietnam war film that nobody ever saw. Hopefully with television and video products that will be corrected.I prefer to think of it as a prequel to Platoon. This film is set in 1964 when America's participation was limited to advisers by this time raised to about 20,000 of them by President Kennedy. Whether if Kennedy had lived and won a second term he would have increased our commitment to a half a million men as Lyndon Johnson did is open to much historical speculation.Major Burt Lancaster heads such an advisory team with his number two Captain Marc Singer. They get some replacements and a new assignment to build a fortress where the French tried years ago and failed.The replacements are a really mixed bag, a sergeant who Lancaster has served with before and respects highly in Jonathan Goldsmith, a very green and eager second lieutenant in Joe Unger, a demolitions man who is a draftee and at that time Vietnam service was a strictly volunteer thing in Craig Wasson, and a medic who is also a junkie in Dennis Howard. For one reason or another all of these get sent forward to build that outpost in a place that suddenly has acquired military significance. I said before this could be a prequel to Platoon. Platoon is set in the time a few years later when the USA was fully militarily committed in Vietnam. Platoon raises the same issues about the futility of that war, but I think Go Tell The Spartans does a much better job. Hard to bring your best effort into the fight since who and what you're fighting and fighting for seems to change weekly.Originally this project was for William Holden and I'm surprised Holden passed on it. Maybe for the better because Lancaster strikes just the right note as the professional soldier in what was a backwater assignment who politics has passed over for promotion. Knowing all that you will understand why Lancaster makes the final decision he does.Two others of note are Evan Kim who is the head of the South Vietnamese regulars and interpreter who Lancaster and company are training. He epitomizes the brutality of the struggle for us in a way that we can't appreciate from the other side because we never meet any of the Viet Cong by name. Dolph Sweet plays the general in charge of the American Vietnam commitment, a General Harnitz. He is closest to a real character because the general in charge their before Johnson raised the troop levels and put in William Westmoreland was Paul Harkins. Joe Unger is who I think gives the best performance as the shavetail lieutenant with all the conventional ideas of war and believes we have got to be with the good guys since we are Americans. He learns fast that you issue uniforms for a reason and wars against people who don't have them are the most difficult.I think one could get a deep understanding of just what America faced in 1964 in Vietnam by watching Go Tell The Spartans.

lord woodburry "Go tell it to the Spartans that here in obedience to their order we lie," ran the quote of Heroditus, the father of Western History which inspired this movie.In a more recent time line, this film is based in part on a vignette Robin Moore told in the book version of Green Berets where American advisors bribe an ARVN (Army of the Republic of Viet Nam)officer to launch a barrage in support of a Republic of Viet Nam (RVN) outpost manned by mountagnards.Go Tell it to the Spartans shows certain aspects of the American advisory personnel: that they became very loyal to the Vietnamese units they worked with. Robin Moore's authoritative text on the subject, not to be confused with the John Wayne movie, would seem to bear this out. Whether the loyalty extended so far as to join in a suicide mission at an outpost apparently written off, well that's hard to say.Yet the movie is a good primer on a subject that's very difficult for most Americans to approach even today.