{"id":1138,"date":"2009-07-16T00:05:13","date_gmt":"2009-07-16T07:05:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/exilestreet.com\/?p=1138"},"modified":"2009-07-15T21:06:58","modified_gmt":"2009-07-16T04:06:58","slug":"new-movie-breaks-hollywood-mold-on-iraq","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/exilestreet.com\/?p=1138","title":{"rendered":"New Movie Breaks Hollywood Mold on Iraq"},"content":{"rendered":"

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by Collen Raezler<\/span> [media critic]<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

<\/strong><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

‘The Hurt Locker’ <\/span><\/strong>allows audiences to draw their own conclusion about Iraq while remaining pro-soldier.<\/p>\n

Hollywood has done the unthinkable. It\u2019s produced a movie set during the Iraq war that doesn\u2019t preach liberal politics or portray American troops as deranged killers.<\/p>\n

Instead, \u201cThe Hurt Locker\u201d plainly tells the story of three soldiers charged with disarming IEDs (improvised explosive devices) in Iraq in 2004. Released in only four theaters last month, it opened on a wider scale last weekend. \u201cLocker\u201d offers audiences more of an insight into what occurred, and continues to occur in Iraq, than all the posturing in all the other films produced about this war.<\/p>\n

\u201cLocker\u201d takes a completely different approach than the 2007 anti-war dramas \u201cIn the Valley of Elah,\u201d \u201cLions for Lambs,\u201d and \u201cRedacted.\u201d It certainly makes war look like hell, but it doesn\u2019t depict U.S. soldiers as murderers and rapists like \u201cElah\u201d and \u201cRedacted\u201d did. Nor does it imply that government will abandon troops like \u201cLions.\u201d<\/p>\n

The movie reflects screenwriter Mark Boal\u2019s time spent as a journalist embedded with a U.S. Army bomb squad in 2004. \u201cIt made a deep impression on me,\u201d he stated in the film\u2019s production notes. \u201cWhen I got home, I thought \u2018people have no idea how these guys live and what they\u2019re up against.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

In \u201cLocker,\u201d audiences see that every decision, every move, is a matter of life or death for troops in Iraq. They see the discipline soldiers must have to perform their duties, even through seemingly tedious assignments. They see the personality conflicts soldiers must work through to carry out orders and the courage of a soldier who, while convinced that he will not survive his tour of duty, still executes his responsibilities. They see the emotional toll such work takes on the soldiers.<\/p>\n

Boal and director Kathryn Bigelow did not create characters with perfect morality but they did not demonize those who willingly step into the most precarious of positions.<\/p>\n

Reaction<\/p>\n

Early indications show that \u201cLocker\u201d has box office potential.<\/p>\n

For starters, the film has enjoyed a wide range of support. Both the liberal Huffington Post and the conservative National Review agree that \u201cLocker\u201d is the best of the Iraq war movies.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe film could also be classified as the best Iraq movie that\u2019s been on the screen to date,\u201d wrote Zorianna Kit on the Huffington Post site. Mark Hemingway at National Review Online noted, \u201c\u2018The Hurt Locker\u2019 remains, at this point, the best Iraq War movie ever made.\u201d<\/p>\n

On RottenTomatoes.com, an aggregate site for movie reviews, \u201cLocker\u201d has earned a 94 percent rating among the nation\u2019s top movie critics. Most reviews include a line about \u201cLocker\u201d being the best movie about Iraq, indicating that even critics are tired of the typical Hollywood\u2019s typical anti-American, anti-war fare.<\/p>\n

\u201cLocker\u201d has yet to become a wide release. It opened in four theaters on June 26 and expanded to 60 theaters last weekend. However, it grossed over $36,000 per theater, more than the nearly $26,000 per theater \u201cTransformers: Revenge of the Fallen\u201d earned. So far, the film earned $1.2 million.<\/p>\n

Has Hollywood Seen the Light?<\/p>\n

Peter Travers, film critic for Rolling Stone, called \u201cIn the Valley of Elah,\u201d a drama about a returning soldier from Iraq who was killed by fellow troops, \u201cessential.\u201d Yet overall, it earned a 72 percent rating by critics and failed to garner interest at the box office. \u201cElah\u201d earned only $14,839 per theater during its opening weekend in a limited release. Opening nationwide, it fared worse, with a $1,984 per theater average. Final domestic ticket sales totaled only $6.8 million. Peter Suderman, now an associate editor of Reason magazine, tagged \u201cElah\u201d as a \u201clame-brained slam against soldiers who\u2019ve seen battle.\u201d<\/p>\n

Critics panned \u201cLions for Lambs,\u201d directed by Robert Redford and starring Hollywood heavyweights Meryl Streep and Tom Cruise. Washington Post\u2019s Ann Hornaday wrote, \u201cthe movie plays too often like a college colloquium.\u201d Box office receipts of $15 million reflected the critics\u2019 feelings, despite the big names attached to the project.<\/p>\n

Michael Medved, talk show host, film critic and CMI Advisory Board member, called \u201cRedacted,\u201d \u201ca loathsome, crude, amateurish and grotesque assault on our troops in Iraq\u201d and \u201cwretched, irresponsible film that richly deserves the public rejection it will, inevitably, receive.\u201d<\/p>\n

Medved was right. Brian de Palma\u2019s \u201cRedacted\u201d explored a situation based on real events in which American soldiers raped an Iraqi girl and murdered her family. YouTube videos, as well as videos from sources like cameraphones and foreign news outlets interspersed throughout the movie gave it the feel of a documentary. Yet the gimmick wasn\u2019t enough to win over the majority of critics. Kenneth Turan of the Los Angeles Times labeled it \u201ckind of a mess.\u201d He further noted, \u201cEven if you agree with its politics, you will probably weep at the ineptitude of it all.\u201d Movie audiences stayed away. The film failed to top $100,000 domestically, earning only little more than $65,000.<\/p>\n

In the two days after Christmas 2007, more people saw Vince Vaughn\u2019s inane comedy \u201cFred Claus\u201d than saw \u201cRedacted\u201d in its entire run. In fact, \u201cClaus\u201d nearly doubled \u201cRedacted\u2019s\u201d receipts in the two days after Christmas in 2007, earning over $126,000 just those two days.<\/p>\n

Honor, Not Revile<\/p>\n

Brigadier General Anthony J. Tata implored Hollywood in a Big Hollywood column to \u201cget to work. If you remove the political lens so that you can see the American heroes fighting the good fight, your only issue will be too many good screenplays and packed movie theaters.\u201d<\/p>\n

The response to \u201cLocker\u201d surely shows Americans want to see war movies in which troops are good people. Not perfect, but courageous, honorable men and women who overcome impossible odds to do their jobs. ExileStreet<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

copyright 2009 Culture and Media Institute
\n<\/em><\/p>\n

Collen Raezler is a staff writer at the Culture and Media Institute,<\/a> a division of the Media Research Center.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

> > by Collen Raezler [media critic] ‘The Hurt Locker’ allows audiences to draw their own conclusion about Iraq while remaining pro-soldier. Hollywood has done the unthinkable. It\u2019s produced a movie set during the Iraq war that doesn\u2019t preach liberal politics or portray American troops as deranged killers.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[19],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/exilestreet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1138"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/exilestreet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/exilestreet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/exilestreet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/exilestreet.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1138"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/exilestreet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1138\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1139,"href":"http:\/\/exilestreet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1138\/revisions\/1139"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/exilestreet.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1138"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/exilestreet.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1138"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/exilestreet.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1138"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}