Movie review of "Rules of Engagement"

Friday, April 7th 2000, 12:00 am

By: News On 6

To some potential viewers, "Rules of Engagement" may sound like a courtship manual composed by an advice columnist. Actually, it's a bombastic, frequently stirring military drama.

It reconfirms the talent of onetime wunderkind director William Friedkin, whose skills were questioned after 1995's elegantly lethargic "Jade." Previously, Mr. Friedkin made audiences experience the heat of hell in "The Exorcist" as well as the heat of urban and tropical jungles in "The French Connection" and "Sorcerer," respectively.

Although much of "Rules of Engagement" occurs in courtroom chambers, pivotal flashbacks deal with Vietnam combat and a military crisis in Yemen. In these segments, the director creates the hell-fire tensions experienced by military commanders who must make immediate, sometimes even arbitrary life-or-death decisions. The episodes carry strong visceral impact.

"Rules of Engagement" also benefits from a top-rank cast, most of whom give admirable performances. The usually grumpy Tommy Lee Jones plays such a humanized character, he even gets to hug his son. As Marine Col. Hays Hodges, a weary second-generation military attorney who has lost confidence in his own legal skills, Mr. Jones displays a vulnerability often absent from his other screen portrayals.

Col. Hays is chosen by Col. Terry Childers to defend him in a court martial. A decorated, revered 30-year Marine veteran, Col. Childers (Samuel L. Jackson) faces court martial for violating orders, an act that may have resulted in the deaths of Yemeni citizens. Col. Childers' mission had been to protect the U.S. Embassy in Yemen, which was surrounded by protesters, and to evacuate the ambassador and his family. He succeeds at the mission, but at the expense of three members of his squadron, while 80 Yemeni adults and children fall victim to Marine gunfire.

Col. Childers and Col. Hays have their own history as comrades-in-arms. Back in Vietnam, Col. Childers, who would also fight in Beirut and Desert Storm, had risked his own life to save Col. Hays.

Col. Hays always considered Col. Childers a heroic patriot, but now he begins to doubt the innocence of the man he's assigned to defend. Other aspects of the court martial involve a possible cover-up conspiracy and the willful destruction of evidence.

Mr. Jackson invests his beleaguered character with intensity, complexity and ferocity, but never at the price of audience empathy. Guy Pearce, as upright here as he appeared to be in "L.A. Confidential," gives a polished performance as the prosecuting attorney, whose arguments are not easily dismissed. Bruce Greenwood is too obviously a smoothie as a vacillating security adviser.

Ben Kingsley combines the proper measures of dignity and enigma as the ambassador. Anne Archer is superb as his wife, whose obvious compassion may not involve any risk-taking.

Particularly in contrast with the stark action scenes, the movie's ending may seem too pat. But "Rules of Engagement" definitely passes inspection.