If, like me, you're a fan of Hong Kong action director John Woo, you might've been wondering where that spark of greatness within him went after he left Hong Kong to continue his career in Hollywood. Basically, apart from the 1997 film Face/Off, none of his US films seems to have had quite the same power to them; the old edge has been dulled somewhat by Hollywood. Woo's most recent film, Windtalkers, doesn't do much to quell my fears.

Windtalkers is based upon an authentic though almost entirely forgotten aspect of WW2, namely the US military's use of a code based upon the Navajo language. The Japanese forces had succeeded in breaking all their other communications codes, and it was hoped that this would prove much harder to crack. Consequently a number of Navajo Indians were drafted into the US army as radiomen, and would have soldiers assigned to them to protect them and prevent them falling into enemy hands.

This, then, is the basic set-up of the film, about three-quarters of which is comprised of a string of battles on the island of Saipan. Nicolas Cage plays Sergeant Joe Enders, still bearing the scars of a recent disastrous mission in the Solomon Islands. He's assigned to look after new Navajo recruit Ben Yahzee, played by Adam Beach. Alongside these two are Christian Slater as another sergeant, Henderson, assigned to protect another Navajo recruit, played by Roger Willie.

Back at home, meanwhile, is Frances O'Connor's character Rita (the only even remotely notable female character in the entire film), the nurse who vainly tries to win the affections of Nic Cage; she only appears on screen during the first half hour or so, though, and thereafter only as a voiceover reading the texts of the letters she writes to him, and which he ignores.

Windtalkers is a recognisably "John Woo" film, particularly in its depictions of the relationships between men, its extreme levels of violence (often handled in slow-motion), and the generally unabashed melodrama of it all. Unfortunately, though, the film (reportedly held back by the studio for about a year after it was actually completed) is far from representing Woo at his best.