Charlie Sheen's 'Navy Seals' Was Supposed To Attract Recruits, But It Made Real Navy SEALs Mad

With a screenplay penned by retired service member Chuck Pfarrer, it was hoped that the film would help draw new recruits into real-life special operations force the United States Navy Sea, Air, and Land Teams — better known as Navy SEALS. After all, 1986’s Top Gun had triggered a rush on U.S. fighter pilot sign-ups. But even though some have embraced the flick for its all-out action, most have sniggered at or dismissed it. And chief among those detractors are the SEALs themselves.

Whether you love it or hate it, Lewis Teague’s 1990 film sure is fun! It’s loaded to the hilt with gun-toting, freefall-parachuting, underwater combat-filled action. Which, for fans of the genre, pretty much ticks all the boxes. The movie boasts some pretty decent star power, too, in Charlie Sheen, Bill Paxton, and Michael Biehn.

Biehn and Sheen, as SEALs James Curran and Dale Hawkins respectively, head up the special operations crew tasked with destroying some American surface-to-air missiles seized by Middle-Eastern terrorists. Sheen had already established a name for himself by 1990, having starred in blockbusters Platoon (1986) and Wall Street (1987). And he’d go on to become one of the highest-paid actors of the 2000s, as the lead in hit sit-com Two and a Half Men.

Biehn, meanwhile, had gained cult hero status as Reese in The Terminator (1984) and Hicks in Aliens (1986). In both films he co-starred with Paxton, and the two would work together yet again on the classic 1993 Western Tombstone. Despite looking set for superstardom, though, Biehn didn’t quite manage to sustain the success of his early career.

That said, the actor has steadily kept working. He starred in a couple of pretty big action movies — Clockstoppers and The Art of War — during the early 2000s. And he appeared in a handful of television series including CBS Western, The Magnificent Seven. Unfortunately, though, most of them tanked. Not to be deterred, Biehn showed off his directing talent with 2010 action flick Blood Bond and horror film The Victim a year later. He appeared in both, too.

Paxton, meanwhile, became one of the biggest movie stars of the 1990s, appearing in a string of blockbusters including Apollo 13 (1995), Twister (1996), and Titanic (1997). But at the beginning of the decade he was better known to fans as Hudson in Aliens. And the 1990s got off to a shaky start for him, with the not terribly well-received Navy SEALS and Predator 2, both of which were released in 1990.

Clearly, Lewis Teague’s action romp had ample star power, so what went wrong for Navy SEALS? Well, almost heralding its poor reception, the film struggled in its conception. The eminent Ridley Scott was producer Brenda Feigen’s first choice of director. But when studio execs failed to strike a deal with Scott, Return of the Jedi’s Richard Marquand was signed up. Tragically, though, Marquand died suddenly following a stroke in 1987.

Teague was eventually signed up as director, but the movie then suffered a series of scriptwriting setbacks. Total Recall writer Gary Goldman — no, not Gary Oldman — collaborated with ex-Navy SEAL Chuck Pfarrer on a new version. Goldman was inspired by the early 1960s war epic The Guns of Navarone — but the re-write apparently wasn’t up to scratch.

After a delay caused by the 1988 Writer’s Strike, Kevin Jarre — the person behind the Rambo sequel — put together a re-draft. But that version’s characters were supposedly thinly drawn, prompting writer Angelo Pizzo to step onboard. And so pre-production crawled along, with numerous script doctors getting involved on further drafts. Apparently Biehn and Sheen had a go, too!

Ironically, it was Biehn who gave the movie one of its most scathing reviews. In a 2012 interview with The AV Club website, the star said, “We wanted to make a really good movie, and it really turned out to be kind of a mish-mash and not a very good movie at all. So it’s really kind of… yeah, it’s probably the worst experience of my life, working on that movie.” Whoah, that’s pretty damning.

And Biehn had some other fascinating insights into the film-making. “What they basically had us doing in the original script was playing volleyball, okay?” the actor recalled. “And it was like, ‘Dude, come on, man, they did that in Top Gun. Do we really have to do the exact same thing?’ So we came up with the golfing stuff.”

It seems Biehn wasn’t the only one unimpressed with the final feature. Peter Rainer of the Los Angeles Times wrote that “the reactionary empty-headedness of this R-rated movie gets to you, spoiling whatever comic-strip enjoyment it might have had.” And Owen Gleiberman of Entertainment Weekly shared Rainer’s disdain, writing, “Navy SEALs isn’t just the most stupidly didactic action movie since The Green Berets. It’s the dullest action movie since The Green Berets.”

Yikes! It seems it wasn’t just real Navy SEALS who had a problem with the flick, then. And a poor box-office performance reflected the bad reviews. In the United States, it grossed only $25 million, hardly even surpassing its budget. An IMDb reviewer later described Navy SEALS as “a dragging film that wishes it was Top Gun.” Another was a little more diplomatic, tagging their review, “Mindless, gung-ho action fare, but reasonably well done.”

But the movie fared better on video and has garnered some decent reviews among the lousy ones. The All Movie website wrote that “viewers seeking rapidly paced action sequences will not be disappointed.” And Jay Boyar of the Orlando Sentinel concluded that “Navy SEALs stands out among this summer’s violence-oriented pictures as the only one that doesn’t leave your brain feeling like mashed potatoes.”

And in a sense, it’s kind of surprising that real-life Navy SEALS reacted so poorly to the film. That’s because significant efforts were made to create scenes that would seem authentic. For instance, the cast were put through an intensive, boot camp-style regime before filming began. This was led by actual SEALs and involved being taught how to use real firearms.

Recalling what the experience was like, as quoted on IMDb, Sheen said, “It was very extensive and very physical. The concentration was on urban combat, door-to-door and hand-to-hand. We learned how to handle weapons, how the chain of command worked, and the scope of international terrorism. It helped us understand the SEALs’ presence on the world scene, and their unusual sense of duty.”

A group of eight former SEALs also became on-set advisors during the film-making. They sometimes even doubled as stuntmen! IMDb quotes producer Bernard Williams as explaining, “Each actor had a SEAL double to whom he could turn for help in handling weapons or perfecting SEAL techniques. They were an on-the-spot source of vital research, to make the movie as much like the real thing as possible.”

Okay, so the film wasn’t actually shot in Beirut, where much of the action takes place. Instead, the historic city of Cartagena in Southern Spain was chosen for its Moorish buildings and cobbled roads that resembled the Lebanese city. But Spain’s navy helpfully supplied all kinds of genuine military transport — from helicopters to submarines — and even some personnel as extras!

Adding to the authenticity was the fact that the screenplay itself was of course written by former Navy SEAL Chuck Pfarrer. It’s said that much of the movie was inspired by Pfarrer’s real-life experiences as a special operator. Oh, and fun fact: the writer makes a cameo in the film, as the officer giving the crew their initial debriefing. He also gets into an argument with Curran (Biehn), if that helps to jog your memory!

Those who’ve seen the movie will know that there’s a strong sense of camaraderie between the team. And that’s aided by the actors being real-life buddies. You see, Michael Biehn, Bill Paxton and Rick Rossovich — who played James Leary — had all worked together before. You’ll probably remember Rossovich best as Slider in Top Gun. But he, Biehn and Paxton had also previously starred in the military drama Lords of Discipline (1983) and, of course, The Terminator (1984).

As we’ve already mentioned, Paxton and Biehn appeared together in Aliens (1986), too. According to IMDb, during a promotional interview for Navy SEALs in 1990, Biehn said, “Working with Bill and Rick was especially beneficial for this picture. SEALs are a team, and we’ve worked together so often that we already know what to expect from each another. Hopefully, it shows up there on the screen.”

The casting of the old pals in Navy SEALs wasn’t coincidental either, as Biehn revealed — according to IMDb — in a later interview. The star recalled, “I think I called Lewis Teague when we were doing Navy Seals, and said what about Bill Paxton, and y’know, I mean we all liked each other, we were all buddies, young and hungry back then, so yeah, we were pulling for each, definitely.”

While actual SEALs might not approve of the movie, for Biehn, the highlight of making the film was being with members of the special operations unit. Talking of his time on the production, according to IMDb, Biehn said, “It was a tough, demanding, exciting film to make. It had to be. Working with the SEALs and portraying them was its own reward — an incredible experience. They’re a breed apart. They’re unique.”

And it also seems that the flick was successful in attracting new recruits. In a 2021 interview with the Business Insider website, a former SEAL said, “That movie probably fooled more people into signing up for the program than anything else. It was our ‘Top Gun’ moment.” But Hollywood’s portrayal of the special operators has given people a false impression, according to two former SEAL commanders.

Josh Willink and Leif Babin now head up the consultancy business Echelon Front. But Willink was once the leader of Task Unit Bruiser, a squad in the Iraq War that also included fellow officer Babin. The two penned a best-selling book together in 2015 called Extreme Ownership: How U.S. Navy SEALs Lead and Win, which explores how SEAL leadership ideals can be applied to business.

And during a 2017 event, Willink and Babin discussed the false image of the SEALs that the entertainment industry has created. Business Insider attended the talk and reported Willink as saying, “We’re not Terminators.” Babin also dismissed Hollywood’s depictions, adding, “I’ve never seen a movie or show that’s accurately captured what it’s like to be in a firefight.”

The reality, Babin explained, is that battles are complex, and it requires a high level of training just to identify where the opponent is and how to best counter them. In movies, though, SEALs swiftly locate and deal with their attackers. But that’s an image that just isn’t accurate, said the former platoon leader.

The mark of a good leader, Willink and Babin explained, is someone who can encourage their troops to think independently and make good calls when it counts. To illustrate the point, Willink described a theoretical situation in which Babin and his team were ordered to give protection to a second squad by covering them from the top of a nearby building.

But when the team arrived on the roof they discovered they were open to enemy attack because there were no protective walls. Had Babin been trained well, he would’ve used his intuition to shift the squad away and on to another floor. He would then radio Willink to explain how the situation had altered.

A good leader, explained the men, doesn’t stand back from the mission and simply bark orders. As Willink explained to Business Insider, “We work with great guys, but they’re humans. They’re human beings. They have attitudes. They have intelligence. They have free will. And they will question your planning. They will question your ideas. And you have to not just tell them what to do.”

The former SEAL commander continued, “More importantly, you have to lead them. You have to explain to them, ‘This is why we’re going to do this operation this way.’” You can certainly see how these principles can be applied to business, too. And why Extreme Ownership was a The New York Times best-seller.

Willink and Babin aren’t the only Navy SEALs to badmouth Teague’s 1990 movie, either. Another former officer — who preferred not to be named — had plenty to say to Business Insider, too. And most of it wasn’t good. The retired operator agreed with the other commanders that Hollywood’s portrayal of SEALs is basically overblown nonsense.

“Let’s just say when it comes to how we do things, the movie depicts a wholly different universe from what actually exists in the Teams. It’s good entertainment but bad reality,” the officer said. Despite its aim of encouraging new recruits, the retired officer suggested that Navy SEALs had done more harm than good to the special warfare community’s standing.

The former SEAL told Insider, “The movie gives the audience the idea that SEALs are cowboys who do whatever they want whenever they want — that there is no accountability whatsoever and that there’s a mission waiting for you every night.” The officer seemingly had Charlie Sheen’s maverick character Dale Hawkins in mind when he made that comment.

Making reference to the Naval Special Warfare Development Group called SEAL Team 6, the retired operator said that “might have been the reality” at one time. But, added the former SEAL, “That was and is certainly not the average… So you’ve got a whole generation of people who watched the movie thinking SEALs are a bunch of chest-beating cowboys, and that has definitely impacted our image to the outside [world].”

The former officer continued, “People, including some Team guys, think that actual Charlie Sheens exist in the community.” He went on to label some of the combat scenes “dangerous and unrealistic,” in particular condemning the way characters shoot from the hip in the film. In reality, especially where the lives of hostages are at stake, such actions would be “a huge no-go,” said the retired SEAL.

So did any of the picture reflect the real deal? Well, yes, actually. A sequence in which the team perform a free-fall parachute jump seemed “pretty accurate” according to the former officer. He added, ““They go through the appropriate pre-jump final checks, and then the guy who gets a malfunction goes through the correct procedure.”

In fact, the retired SEAL operator said that Teague’s movie has since been held up as an example of how not to conduct yourself as a member of a special operations unit. And it’s vastly exaggerated in terms of action, too. According to the officer, a series of missions like we see in the film wouldn’t be experienced in over a decade in the unit.

“It’s a recruitment movie, so you want to show people not what the daily stuff is like — you know, [physical training], admin chores, cleaning weapons, picking up brass — but what the cool, high-speed missions you only get to do a few times in your career” are like, the retired SEAL said. Our favorite comment of his? “But I have to say the hair is on point!”

If you want to know what being a Navy SEAL is really like, you should probably listen to people such as this retired officer or Josh Willink. They’ll teach you a lot more than the movie — and not just about time in combat! Their experience in the forces has equipped them with a lot of skills that they can use in everyday life, too. And now that Willink is retired, he’s committed to sharing those. What he has to say is pretty eye-opening.

As a former military man, Willink claims to know a thing or two about self-discipline. Since retiring from service, he has also built a career out of training strong leaders. And, thankfully, Willink has explained exactly what you can do to climb out of the rut you may have fallen into – as well as how to cultivate the state of mind that leads to success.

Willink enrolled in the Navy straight after high school. And he served for two decades as a member of the SEAL teams. Starting off as an operator, he was then promoted to an officer. He built up quite a reputation as a key member in the SEALs’ fiercest units, too.

Willink actually served two tours in Iraq, during which he served as commander of the SEALs’ Task Unit Bruiser in a 2006 conflict in Ramadi. This battle was described as having some of the most brutal and relentless combat that the SEALs had experienced since the Vietnam War. And it was Willink’s leadership that played a major role in the mission’s overall success.

Yes, Willink and his team were apparently responsible for initiating the area’s stability. And in doing so, his unit received many medals and accolades. The SEALs were in fact recognized as the Special Operations Unit with the most distinguished honors throughout the whole of the Iraq War, with Willink himself ultimately being awarded the Bronze and Silver Stars.

When he returned from Iraq, then, Willink was appointed Officer in Charge of Training for all SEAL Teams. Styling his instructional techniques around his own experiences, the commander devised some of the most demanding and lifelike battle coaching that the world had ever seen. He also implemented a mentor program for upcoming SEAL leaders.

Yet while Willink eventually retired from the military in 2010, his stature remains just as robust. It would perhaps be easy to picture him as a personal trainer – or even a pro-fighter given his love of Brazilian jiu-jitsu. And in the podcast with Ferris, Willink opened up about how he started training when he was a SEAL.

“I remember being on deployment on a ship,” Willink explained. “The food on a ship is not good. I was on a six-month deployment on a ship… and when you’re on a ship as a SEAL, you don’t have a job other than just to work out.” It was an opportunity, then, for some serious exercise.

You see, when Willink began his Navy training, he weighed around 175 pounds. And he completed all the physical exercises – consisting of pushups, pull-ups, dips, obstacle courses, running and swimming – that were asked of him. He also devoured the vast quantities of food on offer to him at the time. You can see, then, how the SEAL managed to gain ten pounds by the time he graduated.

And when Willink was assigned to a platoon, his SEAL colleagues all had the same goal: to bulk up. They were apparently all into lifting weights and wanting to build muscle. As Willink described, “I lifted heavy and ate a lot. I was up to 200 [pounds] in my first platoon, and then after that, I got up to about 225.”

In his Navy days, however, Willink found eating for weight gain as tough as the training. He told Ferriss, “The 1990s [were] a totally different world – ‘the dry years,’ because there was no war going on. I remember we were all just trying to get huge. I remember getting plates full of chicken McNuggets of whatever brand they’d serve in the Navy.”

As it happened, Willink wasn’t all that fond of chicken nuggets, but he was dedicated to doing what was necessary to reach his weight and strength goal. Then, in around 1992 or 1993, the SEAL and his comrades discovered jiu-jitsu. And when a senior officer asked if any of the team were interested in fighting, it was perhaps inevitable that a handful of them jumped at the opportunity.

Willink’s teacher, SEAL Master Chief Steve Bailey, had reached a high level in jiu-jitsu and was incredibly adept at the martial art. He showed Willink and a few colleagues some basic moves, and after that the young SEAL operator was able to handle himself in scraps between comrades. Given that the soldiers were usually stuck on a ship in close quarters, this was a fairly typical part of Navy life.

Willink became more interested in jiu-jitsu around the mid-1990s, however. At that time, he was visited by a former SEAL comrade, Jeff Higgs, who’d left the Navy to dedicate his life to the martial art. And it was then that Willink realized there was more to learn from the discipline than he’d ever envisioned. What’s more, he was hooked.

“[Higgs] was just completely beyond anything I knew,” Willink recalled. “He tapped me out a thousand times. And I said, ‘Hey, where are you training? Give me the place.’ And that was it. I went down the next day and signed up for unlimited classes. I took three classes a day until the present time.”

Eventually, Willink opened his own gym with his training partner, Dean Lister. And even though the jiu-jitsu aficionado was still in the Navy at the time and therefore couldn’t commit fully to the business, the arrangement appeared to work. As Willink explained to Ferriss, “We did a good job and opened up a big space.”

But given Willink’s experience, it probably won’t surprise you to hear that he has fostered a set of habits and techniques that have helped in his transition to Navy retirement. Willink also claims that his SEAL triumphs have simply been a matter of mind over body. And now, he is a successful businessman and author who shares the secrets of his success through his books, podcasts and consulting firm Echelon Front.

Interestingly, though, a large part of Willink’s successes can be put down to self-discipline. You see, he believes that by building a strict routine and sticking to it, you have all the tools that you need to achieve anything you want in life. He even applies this mantra in everyday life, believing that it helps him get the most out of his day. And here are some of his main tips that you may want to take on board, too.

Firstly, Willink advocates writing a list before going to bed. This should include everything that needs to be done the next day. Then, the former SEAL suggests setting an alarm for 30 or 60 minutes before you’d usually wake up. And after a solid night’s sleep, it’s time for the first challenge in self-discipline.

Now, while it can be tempting to hit snooze when the alarm sounds in the morning, this is a no-go in Willink’s world. That, he seems to believe, is your cue to get up and get going. Indeed, the former commander rises, brushes his teeth straight away and goes for a workout. This is followed by a shower, by which time he’s ready to charge through his to-do list.

By repeating these steps day after day, Willink maintains that you can create freedom. In fact, the former SEAL observed during his time in the Navy that the highest achievers were those who started their days while everyone else was still asleep. And after that revelation, he soon got into a routine of waking up at 4:30 a.m. every day.

But what Willink doesn’t support is trying to function on only a few hours’ sleep. And he recognizes that some people perform better the more sleep they get – in which case he suggests simply going to bed earlier. The ex-SEAL commander also recommends maintaining the routine on weekends to avoid tearing up any development that you’ve made.

Some of you may be pleased to hear, though, that Willink also champions small but mighty power naps. Yes, while he acknowledges that it can be exhausting waking up early to work out – we are, after all, human – he has nevertheless learned an effective technique during SEAL training. Apparently, catching some Zs for six to eight minutes is a good way to get some extra rest.

Of course, Willink doesn’t expect everybody to work out like a marine. “Just do some kind of workout,” he stressed in his 2015 book Discipline Equals Freedom: Field Manual. “[It] doesn’t matter if it’s going for a walk around the block, going for a jog, doing some calisthenics... do something that gets your blood flowing and gets your mind in the game.”

And perhaps surprisingly, Willink didn’t excel at anything in particular when he joined the military. “I was not good at anything. I wasn’t great at anything. I couldn’t run fast, I couldn’t swim fast,” he explained to Ferriss. “But I was okay at everything, which is actually better.” You see, rather than being the best in one area, Willink was a solid all-rounder.

“I didn’t have these areas of huge weakness,” Willink further explained to Ferriss. In contrast, while several of his fellow SEAL trainees were athletes who excelled in particular disciplines, other aspects of their drilling were their undoing. “I’m not saying I was great at anything because I really wasn’t,” Willink continued. “I finished middle of the pack on a run, in the middle of the pack of a swim.”

What’s more, Willink believes that everyone already possesses the mental “toughness” to tackle any situation. “Human beings can survive the most insane adversity you can imagine,” he stressed. “People who survive prison camps aren’t superheroes – they’re ordinary people! They have mental toughness and resilience, and so do you.”

Following retirement from the Navy, then, Willink divides his time between consultancy work, podcasting, working out and fatherhood. And yet his approach to each day provides the discipline needed to juggle all of these commitments. The secret, he says, is to find an equilibrium and not to focus heavily on one thing to the detriment of all the others.

For Willink, it takes balance to fulfill your commitments. He revealed to Ferriss in the podcast, “If you focus too much on work, you won’t have a family. If you focus too much on family, you won’t have work. I don’t always do a great job of this. I’ve missed some critical events with my kids because of work, and it’s a sad reality.”

Willink is a father to four kids: a boy and three girls. And, in fact, he has written several books covering the values he instilled in his children to create sound self-discipline. High on the list is an early rise and healthy lifestyle, while elsewhere he stresses the importance of humility and being respectful – just as he would teach business leaders.

The former SEAL also prescribes tidiness, remaining organized and being ready to tackle tasks. But it’s his attention to detail, learned in the military, that he believes is a vital trait. “If you’re in the navy, you’re working on an aircraft, and if you make a mistake working on the aircraft, people die,” he explained in the Ferriss podcast.

In many situations, Willink also recommends keeping a check on your emotions. When it comes to leadership, for instance, it’s important to be assertive but not aggressive and ambitious but not merciless. And while it’s better to be pragmatic in business, being too steely can alienate you from the people under your charge.

Yet Willink notes that pragmatism can also be helpful in relationships. The former SEAL has been married for around 20 years, after all, and so he recognizes that perfection doesn’t exist in a partner. He said, “Getting married is probably the most important decision you’re going to make in your life. You really want to make a good decision.” His advice? Find someone whose quirks you can live with.

“If you can find someone that’s emotionally independent, that doesn’t rely on you to prop them up every day, that’s a big benefit,” Willink explained to Ferriss. And that’s exactly how he described his wife. He added, “If you’re blaming your spouse when things go wrong, that’s not going to work out very well.” Instead, he recommends you tackle issues by being a problem solver.

Strikingly, Willink has made a success of his passions. Along with an exemplary military career under his belt, he now owns a gym, a consulting business and has most recently founded a tea company; he has also ventured into the fitness supplement industry. But if there’s one take away from Willink’s journey, it’s the importance of self-discipline. He has stressed, “I follow my own leadership principles. The principles that I teach, I utilize them myself.”