Marines fight 'The Battle for Marjah'

Last February, U.S. forces attacked the Taliban stronghold of Marjah in Helmand Province. This documentary follows the 1st Bravo Company, 1st Battalion, 6th Marine Regiment, as it moves into the town, building by building, mud-wall by mud-wall. British photojournalist Ben Anderson followed the Marines over a five-month period.

MY SAY HBO and Anderson pack more into these 90 minutes - battlefield tactics, firefights, airstrike strategies, house-to-house searches, working with the Afghan Army, efforts to build ties with local populations - than whole books.

"The Battle for Marjah" brings to mind Sebastian Junger's terrific piece of reporting, "War," without quite that level of detail. Yet never once do you necessarily feel you've learned something, per se, as much as absorbed something. One special accomplishment of this film is that it gives viewers an absolutely visceral sense of what it must be like to be a U.S. Marine on the ground.

This isn't one endless firefight, by any means. Much of the film is preoccupied with silence and the fearful expletive-laden talk that tends to fill it. You certainly admire the enormous courage of the soldiers and Anderson, but also the stoicism of the Afghan people. You tend to absorb their bewilderment as well.

BOTTOM LINE A tremendous film that everyone - children, excluded - should watch. And don't miss the closing credits.

GRADE A+