Uncommon Valor

"Seven men with one thing in common..."

1983 1h 45m EN

😐

6.2

MID

★6.2TMDB · 232

DramaWarAction

Synopsis

Spoiler shield

A group of Vietnam War veterans re-unite to rescue one of their own left behind and taken prisoner by the Vietnamese.

“Seven men with one thing in common...”

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Cast

Gene Hackman
Col. Cal Rhodes
Fred Ward
Wilkes
Robert Stack
MacGregor
Patrick Swayze
Kevin Scott
Harold Sylvester
Johnson
Randall 'Tex' Cobb
Sailor
Tim Thomerson
Charts
Lau Nga-Lai
Lai Fun

Credits

Behind the camera

Director: Ted Kotcheff
Writers: Joe Gayton, Wings Hauser
Languages: English
Countries: United States of America

Want more? Switch to Cinephile mode in the header for DP, composer, budget, box office, production companies, keywords, and release history.

Did you know?

Fun facts 🍿

1 / 7

ERA

Did you know

43 years old — old enough to be someone's favourite childhood film.

MoodPlayr · trivia#01

2 / 7

DIRECTOR

Did you know

Directed by Ted Kotcheff, shot by Stephen H. Burum. Note their partnership — DPs and directors often return to each other across a career.

MoodPlayr · trivia#02

3 / 7

DIRECTOR

Did you know

Original score by James Horner. Worth a dedicated listen after — most great films lose half their impact without the score.

MoodPlayr · trivia#03

4 / 7

DIRECTOR

Did you know

Editor Mark Melnick shaped the rhythm. On an edit-heavy film, the editor does more to control your pulse than the director.

MoodPlayr · trivia#04

5 / 7

CAST

Did you know

Gene Hackman and Fred Ward and Robert Stack carry the top of the cast.

MoodPlayr · trivia#05

6 / 7

FACT

Did you know

Marketing tagline: "Seven men with one thing in common...".

MoodPlayr · trivia#06

7 / 7

WILD

Did you know

IMDB entry: tt0086508 — still the authoritative cross-reference for credits and trivia.

MoodPlayr · trivia#07

Cinephile deep dive

The take

Ted Kotcheff directs. Stephen H. Burum behind the camera. James Horner scores. Mark Melnick cuts. Profitable at the box office. Produced in United States of America. Dialogue in English.

Trivia

Things worth knowing

143 years old — old enough to be someone's favourite childhood film.
2Directed by Ted Kotcheff, shot by Stephen H. Burum. Note their partnership — DPs and directors often return to each other across a career.
3Original score by James Horner. Worth a dedicated listen after — most great films lose half their impact without the score.
4Editor Mark Melnick shaped the rhythm. On an edit-heavy film, the editor does more to control your pulse than the director.
5Gene Hackman and Fred Ward and Robert Stack carry the top of the cast.
6Marketing tagline: "Seven men with one thing in common...".
7IMDB entry: tt0086508 — still the authoritative cross-reference for credits and trivia.
8Classified under 10 themes, including "vietnam war", "vietnam veteran", "vietnam", "post-traumatic stress disorder (ptsd)".

The technical file

Cinematography: Stephen H. Burum
Original score: James Horner
Editing: Mark Melnick
Production design: James L. Schoppe
Makeup / hair: Lynda Gurasich
Sound: Don MacDougall
Stunt coordinator: Conrad E. Palmisano
Runtime: 105 min · 1h 45m
Status: Released
Budget: $11,000,000
Box office: $30,503,151
Return: 277% of budget
Original language: EN
Certification (US): R
IMDB: Uncommon Valor (1983)

Also by

Ted Kotcheff

Trailers & featurettes

Watch the pieces

Community reviews

What people are saying

Lloyd2022-02-27
★ 9/10
Overall, Uncommon Valor (UV) is a less-flashy atypical Hollywood movie of ex-soldiers being reunited to form a team to rescue Vietnam POWs, using good (but not Oscar quality) humor, and decent near-realistic (but not memorable) special effects to tell a 2-part story of forming a rescue team which then performs their mission. Decades after UV was produced, one could say that it's just another run-of-the-mill movie about rescuing Vietnam POWs; however, this was one of the earlier movies of this genre so I don't think it can be fairly compared with the rest of this ilk. (E.g. Missing In Action was 1985 and the 2nd Rambo movie was 1986.) UV isn't a typical Hollywood attempt at making a blockbuster, yet it did very well in the theater. UV is noteworthy for being more emotional than its brethren; it's not a tear-jerker, nor is it a masterpiece drama since it is a bit light-hearted in many places and uses humor liberally. (The humor isn't comedy per se, I felt that its purpose is to reminder us that the characters are misfits and has-beens, ex-soldiers but not ex-warriors, and they're transitioning from plain vanilla real lives to what's normally reserved for elite teams of soldiers like Delta Force. UV has a charm about it that most others lack. The acting isn't superb, but it's still very good. It doesn't have tons of eye-candy special effects, but it does use them fairly appropriately to enhance the story; I'd even go so far to say that, unlike typical Hollywood movies of today, instead of dialogue and story gluing together a bunch of CGI action scenes, UV takes the opposite approach of using action scenes and humor to glue together the story parts and demonstrate that the characters are a bunch of misfits, aging former soldiers brought together for a rescue mission. Patrick Swayze's character is unique here, really gung ho, kind of a counterpoint to the aging ex-soldiers. The 1st half of UV tells a story of ex-soldiers coming together, overcoming their unique prejudices, and re-learning how to work together as a team. Eventually, they form a fairly effective team and the rescue mission is a Go. The action scenes weren't very realistic, but they were still OK, certainly good at demonstrating how the character steadily became a team. The 2nd half of UV is the rescue mission itself, not really anything spectacular and more typical of a Hollywood film. It's not bad at all, just fairly routine, but done well, nonetheless. The action scenes, in particular, are decent but not eye-popping or noteworthy of realism, yet they're sufficient for the story. (Of course, there are scenes which are a bit over-the-top, maybe worth a half-star ding in the overall rating.) PS This review is based on my having seen UV in the theater when released, augmented by my just having watched it again over 30 years later.

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