SummaryA old-school, hard-nosed, hard-living Marine gunnery sergeant Tom Highway (Clint Eastwood) clashes with his superior officers and his ex-wife (Marsha Mason) as he takes command of a motley crew recon platoon with a bad attitude. He teaches them to improvise, adapt and overcome like Stoney Jackson used to say.
Directed By:Clint Eastwood
Written By:James Carabatsos, Dennis Hackin, Joseph Stinson
Heartbreak Ridge
Metascore
Mixed or Average
53
User score
Mixed or Average
5.7
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Top Cast
Metascore
Mixed or Average
31% Positive
5 Reviews
5 Reviews
56% Mixed
9 Reviews
9 Reviews
13% Negative
2 Reviews
2 Reviews
100
As an actor, Eastwood has created his most complex, fully dimensional characterization in Tom Highway; as a director, he has worked to put that characterization in a remarkably mature, self-critical context. Heartbreak Ridge is a film of genuine substance and courage.
70
Heartbreak Ridge offers another vintage Clint Eastwood performance. There are enough mumbled half-liners in this contemporary war pic to satisfy those die-hards eager to see just how he portrays the consummate marine veteran.
User score
Mixed or Average
44% Positive
7 Ratings
7 Ratings
44% Mixed
7 Ratings
7 Ratings
13% Negative
2 Ratings
2 Ratings
Apr 12, 2023
8
Clint as a flawed Marine, taking orders from incompetent officers, trying to reconnect with his ex, what more could you ask for?
Feb 1, 2022
7
'Heartbreak Ridge' is a rather good war film, one I enjoyed a fair bit. Clint Eastwood, to no-one's surprise, is the best performer from the onscreen talent, though I did like the support cast - namely Mario Van Peebles, Boyd Gaines and Arlen Dean Snyder. The plot is, although obvious in where it is heading, fun and holds one's attention. The score doesn't particularly stand out but there is one part around the middle which is neat. Some of the dialogue is a little cringe, but there are some good lines in there for Mr. Eastwood to quip.
60
An unusually thoughtful look (and a broad one) at powers on the wane, at America's shift from Vietnam polarisations to 80's apathy, and at one man teetering on the brink of a lonely old age.
50
Clint's latest doesn't try to do much of anything that hasn't been done before, and better. [15 Dec 1986, p.83]
50
But to tell the truth, the Grenada Incursion looks even sillier on film than it did in the headlines.
40
This kind of macho bantering quickly wears thin, too -- I guess it's not surprising that men who spend most of their time with other men would lard their conversation with taunts of homosexuality and allusions to male gonads, but it's not particularly interesting either. And as a storyteller, Carabatsos is no better than a competent hack. The plot is schematic, the characters are cliche's.
10
This movie is offensive on just about every level.
Jan 21, 2026
6
Watchable genre film as grizzled old school soldier, Eastwood is hired to train Marine misfits, who love to usurp authority, And then team is tested in live battle in Grenada, Mostly sympathetic characters, Lots of funny creative cussing and insults, Decent war action. However, Marsha Mason romance subplot is boring and unnecssary,
Oct 23, 2021
0
It's like there were two movies here. Clint Eastwoods' portrayal of an aging marine, and then there was whatever the rest of cast was doing. The writing was entirely by-the-book, with no surprises and giving token moments to the development of the story. I wish the movie had taken the material seriously and not have a bunch of actors running around pretending to be marines. I would blame the mess entirely on the writer, but Eastwood was able to salvage something out of his character, the rest seemed like they were in a cartoon.
