Valiant One (Christian Movie Review)
While not without exciting moments, Valiant One is a mostly unimaginative military flick.
About the Film
Inspired by true events, Valiant One is an action thriller from the creative team behind faith-based musicals Journey to Bethlehem (2023) and A Week Away (2021). Those earlier films, however, are not representative of what audiences should expect here. Valiant One strives for raw authenticity, with mostly mixed results. While not without some exciting moments, Valiant One is too hollow and unimaginative to be more than a conventional military flick.
Valiant One is a to-the-point thriller. Within the first 15 minutes of the film, a US helicopter crashes in North Korea, and a group of stranded American soldiers and civilians must travel through hostile territory to reach safety. The decision to jump directly into the action effectively establishes the film’s brisk pacing, but it never properly establishes the stakes first. The film unfolds as a series of life-or-death external conflicts but it fails to clearly establish the internal conflict for the characters.
Actor Chase Stokes (Outer Banks) is a capable actor, and he is competent in the role as the unexpected leader of the company. Yet, after being introduced as a cocky young hotshot, his character is never fully developed. A midpoint expositional scene hints at some deeper characterization, but those story threads are dropped and never explored further. The supporting characters are handled in a similar way. Actress Lana Condor gives arguably the film’s standout performance, but her character also lacks depth. As a result, the story feels hollow and rarely provides enough compelling human drama to infuse the intermittent action sequences with meaning beyond the combat spectacle.
The film’s plot is ripe for edge-of-your-seat tension, and the movie does deliver on this potential at times. Valiant One is at its best when it demonstrates restraint, using anticipation and silence to build tension, such as in an effective early scene during which a character attempts to surrender, a decision that would reveal the company’s hidden position.
Unfortunately, the filmmakers often take a “rock ‘em sock ‘em” action flick approach to a story that would have likely been better served as a slow burn thriller. In one scene, the heroes must traverse a sprawling field, temporarily abandoning their cover, to reach shelter. It’s a perfect set up to establish breath-holding anxiety, but it is inexplicably set against a soundtrack of blaring music that completely diffuses any tension. A similar approach is taken with an ensuing firefight. The construction of these scenes has the vibe of a military recruitment commercial rather than fitting the more grounded, realistic tone the film otherwise appears to strive for.
Despite being the product of the creative team behind several faith-based projects, Valiant One is more a patriotic story than it is a religious one. There are a few brief moments involving faith, such a dying man reciting a biblical passage, but these remain on the fringes of the story. With a commitment to authenticity, the film also includes heavy profanity, which may be a deterrent for some Christian viewers. There is a degree of truthfulness in Valiant One that is often lacking in similar, more sanitized stories. At the same time, the unrelenting profanity becomes a sort of crutch used to convey the raw tone, and it becomes more distracting than immersive.
Overall, with some moderate thrills and redemptive themes, Valiant One isn’t without merit, but it simply doesn’t offer enough to distinguish itself as a cinematic experience. It lacks the immersive cinematography or spectacle of many mainstream action films as well as the faith elements that might make the heavy profanity more palatable for Christian audiences. Most importantly, it fails to capture the human element required to make it stand out in a crowded genre.
For Consideration
Language: Heavy profanity throughout, including 91 F-words, 31 S—, and 5-10 other profanities or crude words. God’s name is used 5 times.
Violence: Several men die in a vehicle crash, leaving them with burnt and bloody faces. Characters are shot in the head (with a spray of blood), and others take bullets to the chest.
Sexuality: As two men argue, another character playfully remarks, “You guys should get a room.”
Engage The Film
Heroism and Sacrifice
Opening title cards declare, “Heroes aren’t born. They are made.” Hollywood is full of heroic characters, but arguably nowhere is heroism on fuller cinematic display than in true-life inspired military films. Valiant One is a pro-military story, even as it resists depicting its characters as Hollywoodized ideals.
A central idea in the film is that valor is forged only through tension and conflict, as men and women do what must be done despite the personal cost. Captain Edward Brockman (Chase Stokes) is unprepared to lead the mission. When leadership—and the safety of the company—is thrust upon him, there is no time to waver or resist. He is not innately heroic or self-sacrificing at the beginning, but he becomes the titular “valiant one” by the end.
An interesting motif throughout the film involves a pistol that has been passed down through the generations, featuring the engraved names of men who have carried it. Brockman receives the gun after its former owner’s selfless sacrifice. At several points throughout the film, Brockman is shown contemplating the gun, which functions as a metaphorical representation of the sacrifice the military requires in order to preserve freedom for the next generation. The theme echoes the teaching of Scripture, “Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends” (John 15:13).
