Uncommon Valor 4K Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		4.0
Video		5.0
Audio		5.0
Extras		4.0
Overall		4.5

Uncommon Valor 4K Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Dr. Svet Atanasov March 23, 2026

Ted Kotcheff's "Uncommon Valor" (1983) arrives on 4K Blu-ray courtesy of Kino Lorber. The supplemental features on the release include new program with actor Reb Brown; new program with actor Harold Sylvester; new audio commentary by critic Steve Mitchell and writer/producer Cyrus Voris; new audio commentary by author and critic Douglas E. Winter; and vintage trailer. In English, with optional English SDH subtitles for the main feature. Region-Free.

Rescue operations like the one Ted Kotcheff’s film Uncommon Valor chronicles are real. Some were very well funded and organized, but some were fairly amateurish and clumsy. Frustrated fathers, relatives, and Vietnam War vets launched them after the U.S. government refused to continue searching for POWs that had been abandoned. Some of these rescue operations were successful, and some were failures.

Chuck Norris’ film Missing in Action is undoubtedly the biggest and most well-known film that tackles this subject. It is also the most ridiculed. However, virtually all of the people who ridiculed it in the past did not know better. They argued that rescue operations to recover POWs were a fantasy, exploited by people who liked to create meaningless fireworks. Many who read their writings believed them. The few who knew that these rescue operations were real and dismissed them for political reasons.

Another film like Missing in Action is Stuart Rosenberg’s Let's Get Harry. It came two years after Missing in Action. However, old reports indicate that it was conceived much earlier, and Sum Fuller, who co-wrote the story that inspired it, could have directed it. Let’s Get Harry was also ridiculed and declared a failure, but like Missing in Action, its reconstruction of a risky rescue operation is entirely legitimate.

Kotcheff’s Uncommon Valor came out before Missing in Action and Let’s Get Harry, and it is the only film that managed to irritate the U.S. government. When its production was initiated, the Department of Defense refused to rent military equipment that Kotcheff and members of his team had requested, so, as in the rescue operation it chronicles, they had to improvise to move forward. Kotcheff worked with a screenplay by Joe Gayton, who had combined elements of various true stories shared by a friend of Wings Hauser.

The man who leads the rescue operation in Uncommon Valor is Rhodes (Gene Hackman), a retired U.S. Marine Colonel and Korean War veteran, who believes that his son is still alive in a POW camp somewhere in Laos. Using funds provided by an oil tycoon (Robert Stack), also looking for his son, Rhodes unites several of his son’s former military buddies and, after training near Galveston, Texas, leads the group to Bangkok, Thailand. The plan is to cross into Laos with military gear supplied by the oil tycoon, but when the CIA confiscates it, Rhodes is forced to improvise.

Even though Hackman leads with authority, every member of his team is given plenty of time to leave a lasting impression, and this is one of two big reasons Uncommon Valor looks authentic. The other is its roughness. Indeed, Uncommon Valor is not a nicely polished action film, but a collage of often awkward situations, where former men who have moved on with their lives are drawn back to a deadly place and asked to kill. This is how real rescue operations looked.

The members of Hackman’s team are Blaster (Reb Brown), Sailor (Randall "Tex" Cobb), Wilkes (Fred Ward), Johnson (Harold Sylvester), Charts (Tim Thomerson), Kevin Scott (Patrick Swayze), and a veteran South Vietnamese soldier named Jiang (Kwan Hi Lim).

*After the end of the Vietnam War, U.S. Army Special Forces Lieutenant Colonel Bo Gritz led numerous rescue operations like the one seen in Uncommon Valor. Recently, in 2021, former Force Recon Marine Chad Robichaux also led a similar operation in Afghanistan. (See a report on Robichaux's operation here. A report on another similar operation can be read here as well).

Uncommon Valor 4K Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Kino Lorber's release of Uncommon Valor is a 4K Blu-ray/Blu-ray combo pack. The 4K Blu-ray disc is Region-Free. However, the Blu-ray is Region-A "locked".

Please note that some of the screencaptures included with this article are taken from the 4K Blu-ray and downscaled to 1080p. Therefore, they do not accurately reflect the quality of the 4K content on the 4K Blu-ray disc, including the actual color values of this content.

Screencaptures #1-23 are from the Blu-ray.
Screencaptures #26-39 are from the 4K Blu-ray.

The release presents an exclusive new 4K restoration of Uncommon Valor, sourced from the original camera negative. In native 4K, the 4K restoration can be viewed with Dolby Vision and HDR grades. I chose to view it with Dolby Vision. Later, I spent time with its 1080p presentation on the Blu-ray.

The 4K restoration is a revelation. It gives the entire film an enormously attractive, healthy, and very accurate period appearance. Delineation, clarity, and depth are significantly improved in darker nighttime and brighter daylight footage, and the density levels of all visuals are superior. Color reproduction and balance are very convincing as well. I noticed that in a few areas the blues are rebalanced to make the overall color temperature of the visuals more consistent, and I thought that all changes were excellent. I did not encounter any anomalies. The HDR grade helps the brighter and more subdued footage look terrific, but the strength of the 4K restoration is such that the 1080p presentation looks mighty impressive as well. Image stability is excellent. I did not notice any age-related surface imperfections to report in our review.

Uncommon Valor 4K Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

There are two standard audio tracks on this release: English DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 and English DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0. Optional English SDH subtitles are provided for the main feature.

I viewed the entire film with the DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 track. I thought that it was outstanding, showing great strength in all the right places and boasting a fantastic range of nuanced dynamics. Obviously, there is plenty of action material that provides opportunities for it to impress, but its health and aggressiveness impressed me quite a lot. All exchanges are clear and easy to follow.

Uncommon Valor 4K Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

4K BLU-RAY DISC

• Commentary One - this new audio commentary was recorded by critic Steve Mitchell and writer/producer Cyrus Voris.

• Commentary Two - this new audio commentary was recorded by author and critic Douglas E. Winter.

BLU-RAY DISC

• Commentary One - this new audio commentary was recorded by critic Steve Mitchell and writer/producer Cyrus Voris.

• Commentary Two - this new audio commentary was recorded by author and critic Douglas E. Winter.

• Being Blaster - presented here is a brand new program with actor Reb Brown. In English, not subtitled. (30 min).

• Reluctant Warrior - presented here is a brand new program with actor Harold Sylvester. In English, not subtitled. (49 min).

• Trailer - presented here is a vintage trailer for Uncommon Valor. In English, not subtitled. (2 min).

Uncommon Valor 4K Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Many of the private rescue operations launched by veterans after the end of the Vietnam War have been as unpredictable, dangerous, and often clumsy as the ones seen in Uncommon Valor, Missing in Action, and Let's Get Harry. In the past, many of them were ridiculed, but it was usually by uninformed people and others who had specific reasons to do so. Uncommon Valor was the first big studio film to recreate one such private rescue operation, and I think that it still looks very convincing. Kino Lorber's combo pack presents a magnificent new 4K restoration of it with a couple of excellent new programs, featuring Reb Brown and Harold Sylvester. VERY HIGHLY RECOMMENDED.