Women of Valor
Dir: Buzz Kulik
1986
*
I'm sure intentions were pure with 1986's Women of Valor but the final result is an unfortunate and rather insulting mess. The most obvious issue is that none of it looks like it was in the 1940's. It looks like the 80's, the decade in which it was made. The lead actresses look like 1980's actresses. When telling a story about Prisoners of War, fictional as well as factual, it needs to be handled delicately and with utmost respect, Buzz Kulik's film trundles along clumsily, knocking vases off the shelves and leaving muddy footprints on the carpet. There is absolutely no sense of realism, the acting is crummy and the script is awful. This is how the term 'Made for TV' got it's negative connotations. I suppose at the very least no actual person was slandered in the film but how they could make a film about remembrance and it only being memorable because of how bad it is, makes you wonder what was going through peoples minds when making it an who on earth let it happen and even paid for it.