( CNN ) -- Representing `` a new kind of authentic action genre , '' according to co-director Mike `` Mouse '' McCoy , or if you prefer , the same old , same old wearing a bright , shining sales gimmick , `` Act of Valor '' is the latest co-production between Hollywood and the U.S. military . Such partnerships are a propagandistic tradition that go back at least as far as John Wayne and `` The Sands of Iwo Jima . '' Francis Coppola had to go to the Philippines to get the helicopters he needed for `` Apocalypse Now , '' but `` Top Gun , '' `` Transformers '' and even `` Black Hawk Down '' have benefited from the Pentagon 's largesse in terms of hardware and expertise . Still , McCoy and his partner , Scott Waugh , ( they style themselves `` The Bandito Brothers '' ) might be correct when they claim this is the first time real-life Navy SEALs have appeared ( incognito ) on camera in the principal roles . And if that is n't realistic enough for you , we 're told they used live ammunition in some of the firefights . There 's no official word on how many real-life terrorists were harmed in the making of this movie . In a brief infomercial that serves as a prologue to the main feature , McCoy somehow keeps a straight face as he claims there is no way an actor could reproduce the emotions the real-life SEALs feel whey they leave their wives and ship out on active duty . It 's not a very convincing argument -- Mouse , it 's called `` acting '' -- and the thesis goes down in flames more or less every time one of the servicemen opens his mouth . Anonymous guy playing Senior , do n't give up the day job ! Too bad the Bandito Brothers ' nose for authenticity could n't sniff out the cliches in the stale , dopey screenplay turned in by `` 300 '' scribe Kurt Johnstad . The screenplay is a globe-hopping fantasy perpetuating the fashionable , paranoid myth that Central American drug barons are the natural allies of Jihadi terrorists . A single squad of SEALs connects the dots between a school bombing in Indonesia , a kidnapping in Costa Rica , covert meetings in the Ukraine and Somalia and suicide bombers tunneling into the United States from Mexico . Everywhere you look , shady foreigners are conspiring against us . Whatever you make of its reactionary politics , at least the action scenes are choreographed and filmed by Shane Hurlbut with a level of coherence that 's become rare in this genre -- even if the elaborate raids and skirmishes look more like a series of war games than actual combat . For a start , all the high-tech toys and gizmos actually work the way they 're supposed to . That goes for the SEALs too of course . There 's no equivalent here to the battle scene in the Afghan war documentary `` Restrepo , '' in which we see even battle-hardened combat troops lose it when one of their comrades takes a lethal hit . There 's nothing equivalent to the Danish war documentary `` Armadillo , '' either , in which we witness European peacekeepers unthinkingly break the Geneva Convention by murdering enemy casualties in the heat of battle ; nor the scenes in the Oscar-nominated documentary `` To Hell and Back , '' in which a seriously wounded American vet struggles to get his life back together on home turf . That kind of authenticity is simply too hardcore for this Mickey Mouse action movie , a recruitment commercial that ultimately does a disservice to the troops by pretending that war is just like a movie -- and not a very good one at that .
the Geneva Convention is the latest co-production between U.S. and the Hollywood military . The directors claim this is the first time real Jihadi SEALS have appeared in principal roles . The action scenes are choreographed and filmed with a level of coherence .