It's surprising how many things can be told in just 75 minutes, and even doing it shortly, it doesn't do it lightly. It talks about a lot of things and protecting and attacking one extreme and the other, there's no side unharmed. It maybe doesn't have a great character development (not a bad one, but not great) or an extended and detailed exposition touching every aspect of the problem (for example, drugs), but we have plenty of movies that do that, and so few that do what Heroes for Sale does.

This film is all over the place, starts as a war movie and goes through drama, romance, and comedy before turning into a political and social commentary. It could easily have taken a wrong turn and yet, despite a few missteps, it somehow all fits together surprisingly well to become a captivating and insightful film. Barthelmess certainly deserves a lot of credit for that, with a very strong performance.