Operation Hollywood: SEALs in the Spotlight

(Feb.27–Note: “Act of Valor,” which opened in theaters on Feb. 24, led the box office this past weekend with $24.7 million in ticket sales in the U.S. and Canada. Bloomberg Businessweek provides an exclusive behind-the-scenes look at the making of the film in this story, published on Feb. 2.)

On Nov. 5, 2009, just after 9 p.m., seven Navy SEALs were seated in the belly of a C-130 cargo plane, M4 rifles cradled by their sides. Decorated veterans of multiple deployments—they had among them a Silver Star, two Purple Hearts, and multiple Bronze Stars—the SEALs were fully “jocked up,” prepped to parachute into a hostage rescue. A soft red light suffused the bare interior, the men’s painted faces obscured but for the whites of their eyes and the occasional flash of teeth. They looked terrifying.