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jlhSaw Syriana last night and since then have been perusing the very mixed reviews (Yahoo!Movies has an excellent list of links to various reviews for every movie) and I have to say, I agree more with the group of critics giving it a B-/C (particularly LIsa Schwartzbaum of Entertainment Weekly) than those giving it an A.
First, about the "fearlessness" and message about geopolitics, multinational oil conglomerates and US foreign policy: Tell me something I don't know. I was surprised to be so unsurprised by this film, and in fact, one could have made this film about the United Fruit Company and the activites of the Dulles's (one brother the Sec'y of State, the other the head of the CIA) during the Eisenhower administration, when the US government was meddling in South America, choosing horrific dictatorships over popularly elected reformers if they even hinted at taking the land back for the people. It's an old song, boys, and most of the folks who'll actually see the film have probably heard it before.
Before you blame this on my background in history, my companion,![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
ali_wildgoose had the same reaction: "I knew everything they were talking about already. I listen to NPR." Granted, not everyone listens to NPR, but how many people who don't are really going to see this film?
Second, for a film that prides itself on being so hard-hitting, it pulled a surprising number of punches. I went in expecting moral ambiguity, an everyone's-hands-are-dirty nitty gritty, but what I got was bad oilmen and lawyers, conflicted old hands at the CIA and DOJ, and good Arabs up against it. The line "It's complicated" is used again and again, but the complexity is never really shown, only the usual pile of motives and morals running at cross purposes. And at the end, the film takes the easy, albeit nihilistic, way out.
Third, as was pointed out in many reviews, the film lacks a moral or emotional center. Traffic, which was written by Steven Gaghan (who wrote and directed Syriana), had Benicio del Toro who for all his faults was Our Guy. In Syriana, I'm not sure who Our Guy is. Clooney's Bob is probably a little too jaded, though we root for his ultimate success more than anyone else's. Jeffrey Wright's Bennet should be our guy but he's too reserved for us to be able to make a connection, which ultimately keeps his plot from having the emotional punch it should. Meanwhile the plot centering around Damon's Bryan was so contrived that I couldn't bring myself to care too much about it after the initial shocking event.
So color me disappointed. Though the performances were stellar, every single one, and the issues important, Syriana ultimately fails to come together, and because of this doesn't carry the impact it should.
First, about the "fearlessness" and message about geopolitics, multinational oil conglomerates and US foreign policy: Tell me something I don't know. I was surprised to be so unsurprised by this film, and in fact, one could have made this film about the United Fruit Company and the activites of the Dulles's (one brother the Sec'y of State, the other the head of the CIA) during the Eisenhower administration, when the US government was meddling in South America, choosing horrific dictatorships over popularly elected reformers if they even hinted at taking the land back for the people. It's an old song, boys, and most of the folks who'll actually see the film have probably heard it before.
Before you blame this on my background in history, my companion,
ali_wildgoose had the same reaction: "I knew everything they were talking about already. I listen to NPR." Granted, not everyone listens to NPR, but how many people who don't are really going to see this film?Second, for a film that prides itself on being so hard-hitting, it pulled a surprising number of punches. I went in expecting moral ambiguity, an everyone's-hands-are-dirty nitty gritty, but what I got was bad oilmen and lawyers, conflicted old hands at the CIA and DOJ, and good Arabs up against it. The line "It's complicated" is used again and again, but the complexity is never really shown, only the usual pile of motives and morals running at cross purposes. And at the end, the film takes the easy, albeit nihilistic, way out.
Third, as was pointed out in many reviews, the film lacks a moral or emotional center. Traffic, which was written by Steven Gaghan (who wrote and directed Syriana), had Benicio del Toro who for all his faults was Our Guy. In Syriana, I'm not sure who Our Guy is. Clooney's Bob is probably a little too jaded, though we root for his ultimate success more than anyone else's. Jeffrey Wright's Bennet should be our guy but he's too reserved for us to be able to make a connection, which ultimately keeps his plot from having the emotional punch it should. Meanwhile the plot centering around Damon's Bryan was so contrived that I couldn't bring myself to care too much about it after the initial shocking event.
So color me disappointed. Though the performances were stellar, every single one, and the issues important, Syriana ultimately fails to come together, and because of this doesn't carry the impact it should.
