Review: The Kingdom -- Ryan's Review
Filed under: Action, Drama, Thrillers, New Releases, Universal, Theatrical Reviews, New in Theaters, War
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A world within a world comes crashing down in the opening sequence of The Kingdom, the new film from director (and uncredited actor) Peter Berg. An American compound inside Saudi Arabia, where ballgames and barbecues are the norm and uncovered female faces mock the law that applies outside the gates, is attacked by men with machine guns and bombs. The details are thoroughly convincing in this scene -- as machine gun fire sends the Americans fleeing in a panic, one of the terrorists, wearing the uniform of a Saudi policeman, falsely beckons some of them his way before setting off a vest of explosives. Later that night, after first-responders have quarantined the crime-scene and set up their own camp, a second-wave attack hits, destroying the entire area and creating a media event that has to be dealt with one way or the other by the American political machinery. This is a decent set-up for a movie, and it's as well-executed as you'd want a set-up to be, but it gives birth to an oddly-schizophrenic film.
You could almost call The Kingdom a double-feature, although it seems blithely unaware of its bifurcated status. To explain: the first half of the film -- actually, closer to two-thirds -- is professorial and serious, going so far as to offer the audience a tedious lecture on Saudi Arabia's history and political situation, balancing Western-style realpolitik with the needs of a population that seems to prefer living by religious teachings. As the aftermath of the compound bombing seeps back to Washington, an FBI team led by steely-eyed Jamie Foxx and comprised of Jennifer Garner, Chris Cooper and Jason Bateman, seeks an entry point to the situation; they want to go investigate the bombing, but the State Department prefers to recognize the Saudi government's 'no boots on the ground' mandate, lest they come off as looking like puppets. Much screentime is given over to a scheme by Foxx to blackmail a Saudi diplomat in order to get his team access, and everything up to this point is deliberately structured as a political thriller. That's why the second part of the film is so surprising.
Again, this second part doesn't occur until the last thirty-odd minutes, but it's such a blast-off from the original conceit that it redefines everything that's come before. After we've sat through a solid hour or more of stoic procedure -- Chris Cooper searching the blast zone for clues, Jennifer Garner studying bodies in the morgue, etc.-- everything goes kablooey. Bateman, whose character has been such a non-entity up to that point that we've started to scribble "How did this role make the cut in the Bateman Revitalization Project of 2007"? in our notes, suddenly reveals its purpose. After all the tires have been kicked, all the blast craters walked around in, and all the dead bodies confirmed as being dead, the FBI team is heading back to the airport in a caravan of SUVs, when they are set upon by a terrorist cell. The vehicle carrying the heroes is run off the road and in a well-directed sequence, Bateman's character is yanked out of his seat and carted off to star in his own beheading video. Now, it's go-time.
What follows is an action bonanza as cartoonish as anything Stallone would put his name on, with a body count probably numbering in the hundreds. Undeterred by the skillful daylight grab of their comrade, the FBI team instantly morphs into a squad of indestructible soldiers, complete with a haul of military weaponry that, for the life of me, I can't remember where it came from. I'm sure there was some explanatory footnote shoved in there somewhere, but one second they are unarmed and the next second they are sporting everything short of miniguns. Garner's character, who has been sold to us as a desk-jockey up to this point -- and a weepy one at that -- turns into Lara Croft, shimmying through ceilings and floors with a machine gun, picking off bad guys and dodging shoulder-fired missiles. I have no idea what to say about that, so I'll just relate that, during her shootathon, someone in the front of the theater I was at -- anyone at the Monday night AMC screening can back me up -- screamed out "Yeah, shoot the towelheads!"
That said, it has to be noted that The Kingdom succeeds on several levels: it's expertly photographed, and the script, while sometimes pedantic, isn't full of howlers. There are some nice action-movie moments during the action section and there are some nice political thriller moments during the political thriller section. Also, one test of a good movie is whether it gives you something to talk about after the movie's over, and I've spent much time this week talking with people about The Kingdom -- specifically, what it says about its writer, Matthew Carnahan and its director, Berg. Did they approach this material as a cynical exercise in genre cross-pollination? Did they ask each other aloud whether audiences would question why a team of reality-based FBI suits suddenly turn into something very different? Did the filmmakers buy it, or did they just expect us to buy it? Or has movie-reality and reality-reality become such a foggy soup that it seems an acceptable conceit that anyone authorized to carry a gun must also have it in them to become John McClane?
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
9-29-2007 @ 4:12PM
Pierre said...
That sounds disappointing that it has to devolve into an action-packed conclusion. There was a free screening to see this tomorrow but now I'm less enthused to go.
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9-29-2007 @ 6:13PM
YouFaceTheTick said...
Sigh...it's so sad how little attention movie reviewers pay to films. Oh well, that's why some of us are happy Peter Berg makes films and some of us watch dogsh!t like the Departed and enjoy it regardless of how crappy its script was.
The Kingdom is a great flick all around. Berg drops you in the thick of a foreign culture and it has the impact of making the film tense, intriguing and frustrating. The investigation isn't about uncovering facts, it's about sifting through an alien world's culture. The first two-thirds dovetail nicely with the final third in my eyes.
The stars do not become indestructible heroes in the end but instead are driven by one goal: save their friend. I had seen the trailers and during the first 2/3rds of the film I worried - as did my friend - how they could possibly have the FBI agents involved in the rescue of their friend. Well, they're involved because they never lose sight of Bateman or his kidnappers. They take chase right there and then - grabbing up weapons as they go (from the dead bodies of others throughout the ordeal). They openly state, "If they lose us, he's dead." And what follows is a great package of action direction where we can't help but root for them to succeed. Just their audacity alone fuels the adrenaline rush. From the moment Foxx's character snatches up a rifle and holds it properly, you know these aren't moron cops or typical action film characters. I love that the female character doesn't kick butt but gets her ass kicked: in the battle we see organization and training are invaluable in a firefight. The tension never let's up for the last 30 minutes.
Berg's a multifaceted guy who has directed a great variety of films and he also trusts that audiences are not idiots. That's his failing. Most people are stupid and most people won't get the film. They'll think he's making a statement that osama was right or that america is wrong. Far from it. He's indicting everybody - just as Speilberg did in his unjustly maligned Munich.
Overall it does exactly what it set out to do: entertain. The politics are irrelevant. The statement is not relevant either. All that's important is that you feel pent-up, anxious, interested, baffled and uncomfortable until the climax. They've waved the specter of pending doom from the moment they set down. That foreshadowing must occur and when it does it's almost cathartic.
I liked all the characters, didn't find Bateman to be a footnote and overall think it's easily one of this year's best films. Like Blood Diamond, the film offers more than just explosions and treachery to go with its action/cop story. You get a sense of a world created by Berg and it's a world that's very uncomfortable. The reality of that world compared to ours matters not...it's Berg's world and he owns it with a funny, intelligent script and sure-handed direction.
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9-30-2007 @ 1:19AM
dtpollitt said...
Spot on review, thanks.
I was disappointed in THE KINGDOM because if you mix the political-laced SYRIANA with the gritty action of BLACK HAWK DOWN, you get this movie. This is not necessarily a bad thing, but the film attempted to be both; implementation was short of spectacular. I heard this movie was held off last year for this year's awards season, which makes me wonder what was left on the editing room floor.
The final action sequence included a few thousand ammo rounds, three or four rocket launchers, handful of grenades, and lost all realism; a trait it strove for in its first 95 minutes.
I do like Peter Berg's growth as a director, Michael Mann's influence is quite obvious.
Dan
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9-30-2007 @ 5:23AM
YouFaceTheTick said...
Funny, I see Black Hawk and Syriana as two unwatchably awful films. Both films took themselves way too seriously, while leaving the most important goal of any film behind: entertain. I guess that's why I liked it - it stepped up, didn't talk down to me (Syriana with its "Time Magazine" script by that hack from Traffic) or bore me to tears with bland action for two hours (Black Hawk - hours of pointless carnage with no characters to care about or root for).
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9-30-2007 @ 9:56AM
Mike Farrell said...
I think the reason they were so good at the action parts is because they are an anti-terrorist team and they are trained for it, whether a doctor or other type of investigator. Also Agent Fleury specifically chose those 3 agents, and it isn't really a leap to imagine that he did it because they possessed those talents, they are an anti-terror team out of DC after all. Also, that arsenal came from the enemies they killed as they went. Fleury took his first weapon from the Saudi cop that was driving and was killed. Then, instead of reloading he would just take a gun from the next dead person. They only showed it a couple times, so I think we're suppose to assume that this is what happened the rest of the time.
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9-30-2007 @ 3:10PM
Desmond said...
Yet again a "professional" reviewer gets it WRONG...again. I can't believe these guys think anyone actually values their opinions anymore. "The Kingdom" was an extremely well put together movie that highlights the geopolitical climate today. The acting was great and so was the build up to the final action sequence. What did the reviewer want a 2 hour investigation then roll the credits!? The action wasn't unbelievable and the weapons they used came from the terrorists they killed in the intial ambush and from the 2-3 weapons that were in holders in the front of the SUV that was shown numerous times throughout the movie, also Faris carried around one of the sub machine guns that Gardners character later used through most of the first half of the movie. I also thought it was a nice touch how Berg tried to show all sides of Islam by showing Faris and the other sergeant with their famiies instead of just the radicals that commited the terrorist attack being investigated. An all around great movie and definately looking foward to the DVD release
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9-30-2007 @ 11:33PM
Bill Pendry said...
That was spoilertastic. Thanks!
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10-07-2007 @ 5:13AM
LL said...
I have lived the past 11 years of my life in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and I went to this movie hoping for an earnest (even if 'Hollywood') rendition of some of the very real events that have happened there: gate blasts at western compounds, invasions and bombings, and even the deaths of some men who were tied to vehicles and -- now, folks, this IS real life -- dragged until they were stumps of blood and tissue. I was hoping for an intelligent and far more accurate representation of how the Americans did address the compound blasts in Riyadh and Dammam.
No. Instead, as one reviewer mentioned, the beginning starts out with a brief and relatively interesting opener, a listing of facts with much not possible to include. Seems neutral enough.
Then comes the entrance of the screenplay writer/s and therein lies the problem. The script is c r a p. Bull you-know-what. And it would take a long, long treatise to point out what was inaccurate and why, so let me start with what seemed accurate. The aerial shots of Riyadh looked real. Some of the very brief drive-by street scenes of Saudis and Asian expats on the streets looked about right, although they were tinged with this overriding theme of 'danger'. Bull crap. I just finished teaching my students that, as a woman, I have never felt less endangered than when living in Saudi Arabia.
Which brings me to the female character and her pee'ed off, rebellious stance throughout much of the film, owing no doubt to the relationship she had with the dead comrade. My Saudi friend, who accompanied me to the film, all but laughed as we discussed this notion of the female character having to cover up her arms in front of the prince of Riyadh. Wrong.
Here's another wrong: these characters would never have been placed in a gym, for Saudi hospitality is real and famed and certainly would not place westerners under lock and key by the Saudi military.
One accuracy is the torture for truth. I do intimately know of people who were tortured for three days following the murder of a Filipino after two stole the money he illegally won in a Thai lottery. The confessors (or those ratted out) were finally executed by public beheading. It all sounds so grisly, but these men were jailed for a few years before their appeals, etc. ran out. If the family had granted a 'stay' for 'blood money', they would have been spared. I blather on to make the point that Saudi society is -- in reality -- far MORE interesting than the showmanship of a badly written script.
Yes, the adventure portion of this certainly was 'interesting', but you could see that in any American movie. Most definitely, the Saudis are interested in putting an end to terror in their country. And NOT just to save their own hides, the royals. Most Saudis are good and loving people who find violence, including Israeli violence to Palestinians, abhorrent. The current Saudi king has led the way to peace initiatives that have yet to be taken up, though they are moderate. But, I digress again.
This film is utter fiction, badly representative of virtually all characters and segments of society except the 'enemy', and I guess that will be its 'success'. For everyone wants a demon, an enemy, someone to blame. I can only hope that British people and others everywhere will recognize that this story doesn't even loosely follow the facts of real events. Real people died in Riyadh and elsewhere in Saudi. People of all nationalities living in the country condemn these attacks, appreciate the efforts the Saudis are EFFECTIVELY undertaking to put an end to this crime and terrorism.
Is the moview worth watching? Yes, but don't believe a flippin' thing about it. Let it be the jumping off point for some real reading or perhaps a visit to any of the Middle Eastern countries and, even, Saudi Arabia, if you can afford one of the early open tours available to foreigners.
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