Tears of the Sun was a movie I was looking forward to, primarily because of the involvement of director Antoine Fuqua, whose Training Day really took me by surprise last year.

In Tears of the Sun, Bruce Willis plays a Navy Seal whom, along with a fearless crew, is sent into war torn Nigeria. Their mission is to locate and a mission doctor (Monica Belucci), and snatch her out of harms way. Of course when a by-the-book Willis sees the horrors that await innocent locals, he has (gasp!) a sudden change of heart, and opts to lead the civilians to safety.

Fuqua has emerged as an expert story teller and he stages many of these combat sequences with realism and confidence. Much of Tears of the Sun is drenched in darkness as it's characters journey through the the murky bush jungle fauna, and Fuqua and his technical crew use these settings to full effect.

Willis is the stoic hero here, delivering most of his performance through a series of facial expressions, and he's very good at it. Mr. Willis is an underrated actor, and over the past several years, he's proven himself to be much more than a standard action hero. He has a rugged, old school movie star face. While he is tough here, it's more of an internal toughness, so those looking for John McLane of Die Hard fame, you will most likely be disappointed. Belucci is certainly beautiful, but her toughness is undermined by the fact that she has a team of Navy Seals out to protect her. We never really get to see what she's made of. Still, with turns in the devastating Irreversible now making the rounds and Matrix Reloaded hitting theaters in May, her star is definitely on the rise.

Sadly, the biggest problem with Tears of the Sun is the heavy handed screenplay. This is a movie that beats you over the head with it's message, rather than giving the audience credit for any smarts of their own. True, there are powerful moments here as we witness the brutality inflicted upon innocent villagers, and many of the action-oriented sequences are extremely well staged. Unfortunately, Tears of the Sun can't escape it's cliched filled jungle.

This is a movie with a purpose. It has messages but those messages are overshadowed by a mechanical, predictable screenplay capped off by a loud, crowd pleasing ending. If this were a straight forward action picture like Rambo, all could be forgiven, but this movie aspires to be something more. Unfortunately, as a result, Tears of the Sun only works about half of the time.

Tears of the Sun is a decent film. As I stated, it is well shot and offers a quietly effective Bruce Willis. However, as I watched it, I was reminded of a much better film with similar themes, David O. Russell's innovative Three Kings.