Film
Movie theaters, reviews and showtimes in Chicago, plus articles, trailers and more
- Home
- Box Office
- Listings
- Trailers
- Features
Bookmark this page- Edition:
Men of Honor (2000)
Director: George Tillman Jr
Movie review
From Time Out Film Guide
You can't say Carl Brashear doesn't deserve this solid, old school biopic. With guts and pig headed determination this sharecropper's son signed up for the US Navy in the early '50s, and worked his way through the entrance exam to train as a salvage diver, becoming the first ever black man to qualify. If the institutional racism he has to overcome is hardly a surprise, this occasionally stodgy film offers the striking reminder of the terrifying conditions under which divers worked. Tough enough for any able-bodied man, but even the loss of half a leg in a shipboard accident doesn't deter Brashear from his dedication to duty. Gooding's central performance certainly does the man justice, embodying the strength of will never to take 'no' for an answer. Master Captain Billy Sunday (De Niro), the hard nosed training instructor under pressure to fail Brashear, understands what it means to work your way up, and the growing of respect between these two adversaries lends the proceedings its sturdy narrative fibre. Elsewhere the characterisation is less sure, with Holbrook's racist navy commander a too-obvious loony, and Theron's Mrs Sunday a masochistic puzzle. But when director Tillman takes his camera underwater we too are holding our breath.Author: TJ
Cast & crew
Director: George Tillman Jr
Producer: Robert Teitel, Bill Badalato
Cast: Robert De Niro, Cuba Gooding Jr, Hal Holbrook, Charlize Theron, Aunjanue Ellis, Hal Holbrook, David Keith, Michael Rapaport, Powers Boothe, Joshua Leonard full cast
Duration: 128 mins
Most popular on this site
Features
Gray's anatomy
James Gray wants to push buttons—again.
The next big thing?
Gigantic Releasing tries to rethink indie distribution…without movie theaters.
Red Diva: Lyubov Orlova, First Lady of Soviet Cinema
So you think you can dance, comrade?
Puppet master
Coraline director Henry Selick takes stop-motion animation into 3-D.
Socratic method
Laurent Cantet's approach on the set matches the message of his film.
Wander woman
Kelly Reichardt's Wendy and Lucy puts a Bush-era spin on the road movie.
Oscars
Read our interviews with the nominees, our reviews of the nominated films and more.
What do you think?
Post your review now