Return With Honor: The American Experience (1999)

The Courage Of The Human Spirit Defined

"Return With Honor" is a documentary that everyone should see. Unlike a typical war documentary, this focuses on the inner strengths and emotions of the military men in question, in this case American pilots shot down, imprisoned, and tortured in North Vietnam. I have been privileged to have met many pilots who flew in Vietnam, and a handful of POW's, and can attest that without exception, these are a truly exceptional group of men: this documentary brings their story to life better than any other.

The film profiles multiple prisoners with both current interviews and vintage footage, much of it from North Vietnamese archives (the North Vietnamese film of an F-105 on fire still haunts me). The ultimate lessons here are of courage, the indestructibility of the human spirit, and honor. Despite brutal torture these men had a strict code of honor, and although many were offered early releases in exchange for propaganda useful to the North Vietnamese, their motto was "Return With Honor" and they lived up to it. Far from being mindless military automatons as they were (and still sometimes are) frequently depicted, these men had a keenly intelligent and insightful world view. One thing that amazed me was the degree of forgiveness that the men themselves had for their former captors: one even became the first US Ambassador to Vietnam after political relations were restored. As for specifics, I was disappointed that Leo Thorsness, F-105 pilot and Medal of Honor winner, was not profiled, but I was considerably more impressed with John McCain after viewing this documentary than I previously had been.

The extras on the DVD are all worth watching. I especially liked the biographies of all the men profiled and the "making of" feature. I was amazed by the amount of cooperation and freedom the filmmakers received from the government of Vietnam, and was impressed by the fact that Pete Peterson, a man imprisoned in Hanoi for over six years, was appointed and accepted the Ambassadorship to Vietnam in 1997. Truly the ability of humans to heal and forgive is a wonderful thing and this film shows better than any other I can recall the indomitable nature of the human spirit. June 7, 2008

One of the best you'll ever see.

One of the best war documentaries I have ever seen.

US pilots held as POW's in North Vietnam for years and years.

Interviews, footage of the time (US and North Vietnamese), illustrations of torture tactics, and a narrative structure that keeps you riveted.

I've watched this one many times.

See it. May 3, 2008

Very well done

As an educator, I have looked for different videos that cover the POW experience. Either they concentrate too much on the political and downplay the human element or they try to tell too much at one time.

This video is the best I have seen. In an hour, it explains the POW issue from the prisoners themselves. It is real, it is emotional, it is hard to watch and hear the stories but it lets the story tell itself without a lot of commentary from historians who weren't there.

Excellent. I would recommend this to anyone who teaches Vietnam in the classroom or to anyone interested in the POW experience. December 29, 2007

Not Forgotten

A classic in the genre of Vietnam documentaries. This 1999 film is about American POW airmen, and their ordeal throughout the Vietnam war. What I love about this film is that there is no political angle - these men tell their own stories in their own words, framed by America at the time. No one can walk away from this film and not feel touched. July 11, 2006

A Very Thorough, Powerful Documentary

It is simply the best documentary on the American POWs in North Vietnam. After reading numerous books on the Vietnam POW experience, this film is very thorough. It gets chilling when the POWs are speaking, then a flashback film footage showing their conditions at the time of their captivity. My anger towards Jane Fonda was heightened as I watched this film. I'll never forget her calling the POWs "liars and hypocrites" and also stated that "history will judge them harshly." She also made the insane claim that they were not tortured. I'm glad they omitted Fonda and her POW role, as she would denegrate this film and the truth it displays. September 15, 2005

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