Under Fire

D: Roger Spottiswoode

Orion / Lionsgate (Jonathan Taplin)

US 🇺🇸 1983

127 mins

Thriller / War

W: Ron Shelton & Clayton Frohman

DP: John Alcott

Ed: John Bloom & Mark Conte

Mus: Jerry Goldsmith

Nick Nolte (Russell Price), Gene Hackman (Alex Grazier), Joanna Cassidy (Claire), Ed Harris (Oates), Jean-Louis Trintignant (Marcel Jazy)

Under Fire is a 1983 political thriller starring Nick Nolte as a war photographer, who travels to Nicaragua with a fellow correspondent during a time of revolution to overthrow a dictatorship regime.

It emerges that Nolte is having an affair with his colleague’s wife, as well as unknowingly providing candid photographs to the enemy, making him a target for both sides of the divide.

Very much a thinking man’s action piece, with dialogue and intrigue filling out the absence of action set pieces. Nolte & Hackman are both excellent in their roles, but the film really could have done without the love triangle that doesn’t really add anything to an already precarious situation.

The film also fails to provide any real knowledge about the Somoza regime in Nicaragua, which is a conflict I personally know little about and while it’s good that the film doesn’t get bogged down in excruciating exposition, it could have thrown its audience a bone or two.

Nevertheless, it’s a solid piece of work, well helmed by director Roger Spottiswoode, with a fine ensemble cast and excellent music score by Jerry Goldsmith.

7/10