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 Ryan Phillipe and Channing Tatum
Stop-Loss is the story of lifelong friends Sgt. Brandon King (Ryan Phillippe) and Sgt. Steve Shriver (Channing Tatum), who we first meet in charge of a checkpoint during their last days posted in Tikrit. When Brandon is forced to make a decision that leads to a disastrous ambush, he loses some of his men, others are severely injured and civilian casualties are high.
Returning disillusioned and disconnected to their small Texas town, Brandon and Steve are eager to begin life again, but post-traumatic stress is making that virtually impossible.
Many of his men are having difficulties adjusting to life beyond the military. Especially Tommy (the always on target Joseph Gordon-Levitt), who is in the process of destroying his new marriage through frequent boozing and brawling, while Steve is traumatising fiancee Michele (languid Australian beauty Abbie Cornish, star of Somersault), with his alcohol fuelled flashbacks and digging foxholes in the backyard where he sleeps with a gun.
When Brandon makes it official that he has neither the desire nor the emotional capacity to return to the army, he is stop-lossed: re-enlisted against his will for another tour of duty. Brandon is understandably outraged at what amounts to a de facto draft and he has little choice but to resort to desperate measures to avoid either the war zone or imprisonment.
His unexpected ally is Michele, who agrees to drive Brandon across the country in the hope of meeting with a senator he encountered at his homecoming ceremony. Along the way, other options are considered, including crossing the border to either Canada or Mexico.
Anchored by deftly crafted, career best performances from Phillippe and Tatum (finally proving this frequently shirtless, former Abercrombie & Fitch model is more than pure eye-candy) and elevated by co-writer/director Pierce’s keen eye for detail and non-judgmental approach to her characters; Stop-Loss is one of the most personal, vivid and haunting of the recent Iraq war-themed films.
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