Quartile rating: 7/10 · 1 rating
A Marine Colonel is brought to court-martial after ordering his men to fire on demonstrators surrounding the American embassy in Yemen.
Rules of Engagement is a competent courtroom drama elevated significantly by its lead performances from Tommy Lee Jones and Samuel L. Jackson, who bring genuine weight and charisma to their roles as old friends on opposite sides of a moral and legal dilemma. The plot, while engaging, follows fairly conventional court-martial procedural beats without straying far from genre expectations. The cinematography is serviceable but unremarkable, with some decent location work in Yemen and flashback sequences. The film's central moral ambiguity — was the order justified? — adds some interest, but the script ultimately hedges its bets in ways that feel conventional. The ending resolves things predictably given the genre framework. Novelty is limited as the military courtroom drama is well-trodden territory and this film does not distinguish itself meaningfully from predecessors like A Few Good Men.