Globe & Mail Thursday March 29 2007
http://tinyurl.com/2mpe9s
Crazy Eights is your must-see TV tonight
By ANDREW RYAN
Thursday, March 29, 2007 – Page R3
Spend any amount of time at an airport and you'll see some of our Canadian soldiers. As in battle, they wear fatigues and travel in packs, invariably hauling enormous duffle bags on their way somewhere. They always look absurdly young.
And if you read the news, you have to wonder if they're en route to or from Afghanistan, where our troops remain embedded in some manner of war. It's not pleasant to envision those young faces going into battle, but the fight against the Taliban rages on daily and we're in the middle of it. Those are young Canadian men and women over there, and some don't come back.
Crazy Eights (CBC, 8 p.m.) is tonight's assignment for real Canadians. You can miss Ugly Betty or Survivor this one time, or tape them for later. It's required viewing for those invested in our country's war effort in Afghanistan, which means everyone, let's hope.
Crazy Eights comes courtesy of filmmaker Gordon Henderson, who spent most of last October with the Royal Canadian Regiment Charles Company Eight Platoon, more popularly known as the Crazy Eights. The famed military unit has suffered more casualties than any other Canadian squadron since we went into Afghanistan. These are the front-line Canucks.
The film provides a stark video postcard from a handful of those young Canadians we've sent off to the dusty trenches. Here again, they all look so very young.
The Crazy Eights aren't crazy, of course; in fact, they're like any other nice Canadian kids in their late teens and early 20s. Most seem chipper and pragmatic regarding the continuing conflict in Afghanistan. And to a person, the Crazy Eights appear unfazed by the tragedy that befell the unit a month before the film was made: Labour Day weekend last year, the Eights played a key role in Operation Medusa -- the most intense battle for Canadian troops since the Korean War. The morning after, the Eights were mistakenly strafed by an American warplane. It's called "friendly fire" in war parlance, and this time it resulted in one dead Canadian soldier, and 30 injured. Several of the Crazy Eights display still-healing shrapnel wounds.
And the war in Afghanistan wears on. The film includes heated battle scenes involving tracer fire directed at the Eights, who reply with appropriate force. Night-vision cameras follow the unit on vehicle patrol. The soldiers remain remarkably calm considering they're travelling roads known to be rife with land mines.
It's a concise and stylish profile of the elite fighting unit, which comes off as professional and impressive at all times. Not one Crazy Eight gripes about the harsh conditions, or questions the tour of duty or the broader battle mission.
Some admit they miss watching hockey, however. We are Canadian.
