LAW OF RETURN is an unconnected follow-up to the one-time hit JARHEAD starring Jake Gyllenhaal, but it has nothing in common with that movie. Instead this is a basic low budget war flick made by Israel, starring an Israeli cast and shot in Bulgaria, so believe me when I say it doesn't look good. The interchangeable characters are really irritating to spend time with, and there's no real action to speak of; the whole film feels like a cheap little pantomime, a piece of propaganda not worth bothering with.

After eighteen years, Marine special forces soldier Torres (Amaury Nolasco) is being sidelined into retirement. He is sent to the Golan Heights on a joint training exercise with the Israelis. Israeli pilot Major Ronan Jackson is shot down over Syria and captured by an Iranian-backed militia. Ronan happens to be the son of an American Senator (Robert Patrick). A rescue operation is quickly launched with both American and Israeli soldiers.

There is a good amount of action in this middle of the road lower rank war movie. Some of it is 80's Rambo shoot them up. Some of it is effective real-adjacent action. The sniper at the border is effective but one downed pilot taking out multiple militants is closer to bad 80's action. It's very unbelievable that the Israelis could only come up with one drone for air support during the whole mission. It's also unlikely that only such a small force is used despite the movie's explanation. Every small step forward comes with a step backwards. The trap is a good twist but then it's unreasonable to Rambo their way out. The great aspect of the original Jarhead is that it's not a simple shoot them up war movie. This is falling more into the low-rate middling war action genre.

The film centers on two characters. Gunnery Sgt. David Flores is in special ops. He is moved from the war zone in Afghanistan to an easy gig in Eilat, Israel for his last five months of service. He spends time on the phone calling his family back in the states.

Our second character is American born Israeli pilot Major Ronan Jackson (Devon Sawa),son of US senator (Robert Patrick). He is shot down over Syria and taken captive by a local ISIS-style group. Instead off sending in Israeli forces to rescue, they use the U.S. Marines which most likely would never happen.

The characters ranged from fair to good. The plot lacked plausibility. If you like a special ops rescue type of film, you could do worse.

Guide: F-word. Nudity (Shanti Ashanti)