This Blu-ray release ties in with the 20th anniversary of this film. The chances are however, that you've never heard of it.

Despite not achieving mass appeal on its initial release, A Midnight Clear is a title that most definitely deserves a wider audience.

It's 1944 and a group of US soldiers find themselves deep in the Ardennes Forest. Major Griffin (John C. McGinley) has word of a German advance so sends out a team to a deserted house to keep watch.

This team of six is headed by the young sergeant Will Knott (Ethan Hawke), who is known affectionately as 'Won't' by his friends. Although together they are part of an Intelligence unit, as Will points out, you have to question a group's intelligence when they've already last half of their men.

So off Will goes, with Bud (Peter Berg), Mel (Kevin Dillon), Stan (Arye Gross), Paul 'Father' Mundy (Frank Whaley) & Vance 'Mother' Wilkins (Gary Sinise) in tow. After making themselves at home, they do indeed start to witness activity of German soldiers in their very near vicinity.

What's less clear is their motive; the enemy is seemingly playing with their minds, which completely freaks the team out. But what starts out as mind games soon turns into a remarkable turn of events for all concerned. There's a chance that they could all get out unscathed, but the war has other ideas.

They just don't make snowmen like they used to.

Based on the novel by William Wharton, who also wrote Birdy, director Keith Gordon created what has to be considered one of the quietest anti-war films of all time. The film is held together by a smart voice over supplied by Hawke's character Will, as he gently narrates this story of friends and foes.

At the centre of the film is a message of the futility of war. All of the characters are deeply affected by it to varying degrees, but each one shares the feeling of the pointlessness of it all. It's this common bond that pushes most of the US soldiers to a higher level of consciousness; they're united by a thin vein of hope of staying alive and therefore aren't clouded by their army's dictate to kill the enemy at all cost.

What Gordon managed to achieve was a cast made up of fresh meat (much like the characters they play), who all went on to make a name for themselves. At this early stage of their careers however, they managed to convey a raw and honest portrayal of a bunch of men with sensitive, thoughtful sides. Not one of them comes across as the generic gung ho character that shoots first and asks questions later.

They're certainly helped by an isolated location. Away from the severe peer pressure of the rest of the military, the house they find themselves in, surrounded by the purity of snow, allows them to lose a little of the toughness of military life and tap once again into their humanity. The surroundings also serve almost as visual poetry, highlighting the tranquillity of nature versus the uproar of man at war.

The end result is a beautifully crafted and poignant look at the devastation of war – all without the need for over the top battle scenes and violent confrontations – making it a deeply moving experience.

A Midnight Clear is a true lost gem that, despite being twenty years old, hasn't lost any of its charm or impact. In fact it has every right to be considered a modern classic and should be promoted to alongside the heady ranks of such films as Apocalypse Now and Platoon in the canon of American war films.