Green Zone

I'm fast coming to the opinion that there's no finer director of thoughtful, adult-oriented action pictures than Paul Greengrass. The two latter Bourne pictures, plus United 93, are as good examples of any of viscerally engaging, pulse-pounding action films that engage the intellect as well as the emotions. Even Bloody Sunday, which isn't an action picture per se, was a seamless melding of large-scale tumult and finely wrought character studies.

His latest is Green Zone, which came and went with nary a noise earlier this spring, another film about the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan that have not inspired the public to attend. Inspired by a book I read, Imperial Life in the Emerald City, Green Zone is a blistering look at the arrogance and folly of the nation-builders following the invasion of Iraq and the toppling of Saddam Hussein from power.

Our way in is Matt Damon, as a chief warrant officer on a mission to find WMDs. He is coming up empty, and questions the intelligence he is receiving. He is joined by a CIA officer (Brendan Gleeson), who is against the U.S. taking steps to dismantle the Iraqi army, which defies the will of a mid-level bureaucrat (Greg Kinnear). The script, by Brian Helgeland, is very smart, but will probably be appreciated more by those who have a knowledge of went on--those who were living in a cave may be a bit confused. The truth is, of course, that in retrospect there were no WMDs, and the reason for the invasion was based on a complete lie.

Damon, with Gleeson's help, tries to track down the source of Kinnear's intelligence, an Iraqi general who is earned himself the "Jack of Clubs" in the card deck of wanted Iraqis. There's a lot of cat and mouse between the parties involved. I've read that some conservatives were angry with this film because it was supposedly anti-war and anti-American. I wonder what the problem with being anti-war is, and as for the latter, when the American government is peddling lies to the public in order to line the pockets of corporations like Halliburton and further the interests of an administration in power, a little muckraking is a good thing.

Greengrass is known for using hand-held cameras, which normally I don't care for, but he has the knack for making them work. There doesn't seem to be a moment here when the tension isn't as thick as pea soup, even in quiet moments. Damon, a movie star that seems to make choices based on things beyond his paycheck and his Q ratings, is authentic, and Kinnear properly slimy. Amy Ryan, in a brief role as a reporter who realizes she's been used as a dupe, is also good.