Curapedi
I cannot think of one single thing that I would change about this film. The acting is incomparable, the directing deft, and the writing poignantly brilliant.
Siflutter
It's easily one of the freshest, sharpest and most enjoyable films of this year.
Aubrey Hackett
While it is a pity that the story wasn't told with more visual finesse, this is trivial compared to our real-world problems. It takes a good movie to put that into perspective.
Clarissa Mora
The tone of this movie is interesting -- the stakes are both dramatic and high, but it's balanced with a lot of fun, tongue and cheek dialogue.
Brent Burkwell
More BS from the left, obviously the concentration on the "allied" attempts to stop the burning fields is intended to give credit where it is NOT due. The USA did the bulk of the work, mentioning the tank mounted twin Mig engines proves that the left wanted to take away the bulk of the credit from the USA and give it to less deserving nations. Hungary? Give me a break! The left seeks to alter history to fit their twisted view of the world, namely, capitalism=bad, communism/socialism/totalitarian regimes = the public good. If you are a thinking person, it doesn't take long to see through this propaganda. Utter BS, avoid at all costs.
Horst in Translation (filmreviews@web.de)
"Fires of Kuwait" is a 35-minute documentary that will have its 25th birthday next year. The director is David Douglas who has worked on several other IMAX films as well. Narrator is Oscar nominee Rip Torn and speaking about Oscar nominees, this one also got in with the Academy. Strangely enough, it was nominated in the feature category and not in the documentary short category. I have no explanation for that though. Anyway, back to this film here, the fact that I rated it fairly low has only to do with personal preference. My interest in technology is not that big and I definitely would have enjoyed it more if it was more about the political context of Hussein setting these oil fields on fire. There are some moments that deal with this subject, but really the vast majority of the film is about how these fires got extinguished from the technological perspective and that was just something I did not find too interesting. The flames were also not spectacular enough to keep me interested for over 20 minutes. For firefighters, maybe even people who worked there back then, this may be a great watch. Everybody else can skip it.
lonflexx
It may not be fair to review this work from the DVD version rather than the IMAX adventure it was meant to be - the Warner DVD picture quality being uncomfortably compressed. Still, for a purely visual experience as this was meant to be, camera placement counts for a lot and David Douglas has nothing on Herzog's team. It's the difference between hack prose and epic poetry.Douglas' approach to the ruination of Kuwaiti oil fields juxtaposes the horrific fire geysers underneath didactic narration about firefighting (voiceover by the lackluster Rip Torn), reducing the impact to that of an in-house industry video or recruiting tool for the Army Corps of Engineers. After showing the colossal scale of environmental devastation, Douglas has the temerity to put a feel-good spin at the end, creating a bizarre agenda that is anything but convincing.
c_nordby
The neatest thing about this documentary was watching the fire crews come up with the many ingenious ways to battle the various oil well fires. I saw this film on an IMAX screen which certainly added it's own cinematic touch to the works. There's nothing quite like watching a 40 ft. pillar of flame shooting up in front of you. I've also seen the video version, and while it's not as visually stunning, it is still highly enjoyable.