Watching Act of Valor is a bit like being immersed in the video game Call of Duty. The movie, which follows a group of Navy SEALs as they fight terrorism all over the planet, often unfolds from the combatants' point-of-view, a intimate and claustrophobic place in the action that telegraphs the terror involved in what the soldiers are doing.

You could easily look at Act of Valor as a recruitment video for the Armed Forces. Weirdly, that's just what it is. According to various U.S. news outlets, the movie was commissioned by the Navy's Special Warfare Command and was designed to attract new recruits to the Navy SEALs.

That's kind of off-putting, but mostly none of our business. As a movie, Act of Valor is a good guys vs. bad guys combat project bound to thrill a target male audience of 15+. The film has two connected (and energetic) storylines. The first is the crucial rescue of a female CIA agent being held and tortured; the second is a complex campaign to thwart terrorists who have come up with an undetectable explosive. Said explosive can be stitched into vests and used to aid terrorist suicides, with catastrophic results. And those terrorists intend to do their dirty work right on American soil! No way!

The action in Act of Valor starts with training air jumps in San Diego and moves out to the Philippines, Ukraine, the South Pacific, Somalia and places in Central America. The men, some actors and some real Navy SEALs, are pictured with their wives and children and then viewed heading off to war to protect the rest of us. One soldier is involved in an ongoing conversation throughout the film about the child he and his wife are expecting; when it comes to setting up sympathy, there's nothing going on here you'd be inclined to describe as subtle filmmaking.

Act of Valor is a movie that involves the same sort of action/adventure you'd anticipate at any pro-Armed Forces film. It's all upside. The film is an explosive, testosterone-soaked drama with a soldier of fortune-y air to it; these are men's men saving the world from terrorists, and it seems likely the Navy will get their money's worth of promotion from it.

Those not intending to do a combat tour will quickly forget that many of the actors are not professionals and simply enjoy the macho, B-movie flavour of Act of Valor.
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