It is a performances centric movie

Wow! What a bizarre film! Unfortunately the few funny moments there were were quite overshadowed by it's completely weird and random vibe throughout.

The acting is good, and the firecracker script has some excellent ideas.

It is an exhilarating, distressing, funny and profound film, with one of the more memorable film scores in years,

Only one ten second glance at this movies trailer was my insight, before watching it today. So having only this perspective and knowing nothing of the actual events that inspired it, is what I believe to be the right way, and how stories are supposed to be presented on screen. A recent personal brush with this sort of scare, gave me added respect for these men and the story. I quickly learned how a tiny flame coupled with drought conditions are a recipe for disaster. With the help of a slight breeze, a tiny grass fire becomes an auncontainable monster in minutes. Fortunately for me I have great next door neighbor's. The husband and wife duo acted with valor and urgency in helping me save my house and most of my 5 acre place. Real life interaction between characters was so refreshing and well depicted. No overdramatized and unnecessary BUTT HURTEDNESS in every scene. Just good natured yet sometimes extreme ribbing among friends and REAL WORKING MEN... Brolin an Bridges are MENS ACTORS. REAL MENS actors.

True story well directed... you connect to all the characters and family by end of the movie. It's so realistic great job

Great all the way, how the director made os feel almost as heart breaking and intense as a good war movie, but with fire fighters :) Woth the 2h30 run time !!

My wife and I watched this at home on DVD from our public library. It is based on real people and real events from just a few years ago so it is very authentic. Never before had a municipal fire crew been certified as a hot shot crew, assigned to the most demanding situations. Josh Brolin as Eric Marsh leads the efforts to recruit, equip, and train the guys to accomplish this. One of his recruits is Miles Teller as Brendan McDonough ( a survivor who consulted for the movie). Brendan had pretty well made a mess of his life, including booze and drugs, and then found out he got a pretty young lady pregnant. His joining the firefighters changed his life.The movie runs a bit slow in parts, and long at about 2 hours and 15 minutes, but it is extremely well made, focusing ultimately more on the men and women, and overall relationships of everyone, but the fire fighting scenes are quite scary. I know they all wanted to do that job but for me, staying away from fires is more rewarding.