Green Zone

Director: Paul Greengrass

Cast: Matt Damon, Greg Kinnear, Said Faraj, Amy Ryan, Brendan Gleeson

Year: 2010

Genre: War / Thriller

Rating:

Cinema-Reader – 7.6
MDB – 7.2

FilmAffinity – 6.7

(Click picture for Trailer)

Cinema-Reader Synopsis:

Chief Warrant Roy Miller (Matt Damon) is an US army official on charge of a squad which target is aim at the search of WMD (weapons of massive destructions) in Iraq.

After months of unsuccessful search, Miller and his crew are getting pissed. However a local gives them a hint of where to catch red-handed one of the most notorious personalities within Hussein’s army in a high level meeting of revels. Breaking on during the meeting, and despite the target manages to getaway, Miller gets a vital piece for the ingoing of the whole war; a notebook with spots and save houses of all revel’s high commands.

All of a sudden, Miller finds himself between a war full of lies and false patriotism that will push him to re-define his principles and in which side he’s.

Cinema-Reader Review:

Paul Greengrass, filmmaker that brought us the brand new Bourne saga (all but Bourne Supremacy, the only forgettable within the whole sequel), comes along with Matt Damon once again to barely adapt a novel describing the shameless fact of the lack of proofs and evidences of WMD within the arguments submitted by US High Command in order to justify the invasion carried on Iraqi soil.

Shot in a fantastic way that makes viewer enjoy the action of the movie (Greengrass trade mark which already shown in the frantic car scenes of Bourne both blockbusters), is worth saying the director doesn’t lose the aim of the plot diverting the looking glass far from what is really important, the complex web behind the reasons given to justify the US army intervention.

Besides what can seem at first sight, and after prior attempts that failed in the goal of taking Iraq conflict and all controversial along, Green Zone brings a different approach as well as an appreciable and uncommon point of view in which American and the white collar that command the power of the US army and where the good are at least as villain as the villain themselves.

About the performances, I must confess I do fancy Matt Damon more and more (no sexual meaning implicit at all!!!) due to his wide assortment of different performances and characters. However handling a rifle is even more credible.
Along comes Greg Kinnear normally seen on comedies (Little Miss Sunshine, Stuck on you, As Good as it Gets) but hardly ever seen within thriller/drama contest. And seems this genre suits on him quite well making a convincing role of a jerk US Army command trying to hide which are the real reason behind the occupation of Iraq.

Having said all these, here comes my open question.

Filmed with terrific technique and surgeon accuracy for action scenes, with a solid and credible script with no gaps on the plot in all movie, and with performances such worth mentioning as fulfilled by Kinnear, Damon and Gleeson; why this film ain’t as worth deserved for an Academy Award acknowledgement?

Is Hurted Locker a deserved winner? Or just acknowledged for the fact of being the only movie over the average in a year with no major and awesome film in which the only movie highlighted (for several and different reasons) has been Avatar?