Sand Castle does a respectable job of depicting a wretched conflict that none of its participants wanted, but its reason for being feels a little built on sand.

An engaging, gripping fact-based drama starring Nicholas Hoult (Mad Max: Fury Road) as a young machine gunner in the U.S. Marines whose platoon is put in the impossible position of saving an Iraqi village.

Offers too little to the War is Hell genre to be noteworthy.

Even with its coming-of-age overtones, “Sand Castle” lacks the complexity to tell a stronger story.