Fourteen years later, after an unending search and aimless attempts to get the American government to even acknowledge his son, Frank, even still exists, Rhodes puts a small squad together with a plan of marching into Laos and saving the American POWs he believes is still contained there.

He acquires the immense funding required from a Texas oil man, played by Robert Stack (TV's Unsolved Mysteries), who also has a son held at the same camp. Rhodes decides to form his squad with members of Frank's former platoon who managed to survive the war itself, but barely survive its effects at home.

I loved how the picture used evidence of Frank's existence, very similar to evidence the POW/MIA organization has regarding other veterans of the Vietnam War, most of which already appear on the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Wall in Washington D.C.

For instance, many marines and pilots are taught survival tricks for when they get captures. One of those tricks is the ability to fasten signals of their location and existence, like tying large trees together to spell out their unit number, in such a way that only satellite technology could read it.

That is how the Colonel ends up discovering his son is alive. Satellite photos pick up his son's squad number at a camp in Laos.

The picture is very tough to believe, but somehow I'm able to suspend mine on this picture.

The characters were well written. We know each of their inner motivations, including Stack's character.

I also really liked how the mission was fool proof and how everyone had to improvise to achieve his objective. A couple even give up their lives to save the objective and the others in it.

The film is very heroic and has a realistic ending, but because sound engineering hadn't come along in development until the late eighties, the sound effects for this picture suck.

Among the performances, Hackman is always awesome, but for the most part, no one stands out. Fred Ward (Road Trip) is also in the picture, as well as a young Patrick Swayze (Red Dawn), still in his pre-"Dirty Dancing" years.

Director Ted Kotcheff (First Blood) has always shown immense care for his projects relating to the Vietnam War and this movie is no exception.

Overall, the film is very exciting and if you support the POW/MIA movement, then you'll DEFINITELY enjoy this picture, despite its faults.