Pacionsbo Absolutely Fantastic

Dynamixor The performances transcend the film's tropes, grounding it in characters that feel more complete than this subgenre often produces.

Rosie Searle It's the kind of movie you'll want to see a second time with someone who hasn't seen it yet, to remember what it was like to watch it for the first time.

Janis One of the most extraordinary films you will see this year. Take that as you want.

tomdoyle1962 I was an uncredited extra in this film and got about 8 seconds of on-camera time out of it. We were filming in the crew quarters of the USS North Carolina. While the crew slept, an alarm went off. After an officer told Schroeder "We're going to war", the crew filed out behind him. I planned to toss and turn in the background before the lights came up (to give myself more of a chance of being seen) and lo and behold, that made it in the film in addition to me filing out of the quarters. I've seen this movie on Lifetime a few times in the past few years, and I get a kick out of that scene every time it comes on. I remember Schroeder being aloof towards the extras during shooting, but then I don't think I expected him to sit down with us and have lunch. He was the central character of the film, after all. In terms of the overall film, I found the story interesting. It's odd that we go to such lengths to protect children from all kinds of dangers now. Some group would have some naval officer arrested for felony child abuse today for daring to let a 12 year old into a battle zone. All in all, it was a good "made for TV" movie of its time.

mamie16354 I think this movie is a very good movie. My brother and I watched this when we were younger and thoroughly enjoyed watching the movie. We got to talking about it a while back and decided to find the name of the movie as we could not remember. We were telling his wife about it and saying how we would like to see the movie again and get a copy. We may have been young, but we still think the movie is very good. It is about a young boy that had a dysfunctional family and joined the navy during World War II at the age of twelve. The fact that he was so young was not revealed until much later after he had been awarded for his bravery. We enjoyed the movies as it was about a young boy not much older than ourselves. The whole family enjoyed it. It is a family oriented movie and I recommend you watch Too young the hero.

nicoal When you see Rick in the film it's easy to understand that it is impossible to be a 12 years old boy. I think he is around 20 in the film but the director may used this actor because he though that this was the only that he could find and fit for the role. Of course some things in the movie never happened but they were created so the film could be success. I hoped that films like that would be produced even today. As an overview of the film its shows the World War II at the side of U.S. Navy through the eyes of a young boy.

UPSETTER-2 There are several troubling components of this movie other than the criticism that Shroder was not 12 years old when playing the role. This lad enlisted fraudently as did many other under-aged enlistees in World War 2. Some because of patriotism but in the case of this boy it was because of economic deprivation. He performed his war duties well enough to be awarded citations for bravery. Due to some bureaucratic foul-up he was jailed when returning from leave for desertion. The sad part of this story is that he was raped while in the brig and even the chaplain admitted he was not authorized to write to family members indicating where he was. A fellow prisoner upon release did courageously call the victim's sister and she contacted a local paper to secure his release. But the final absurdity is seen when an officer tells the released victim to not divulge what happened to him. The navy did not want its dirty wash shown to the world.