Ok, everyone knows Usama Bin Laden is dead. Some navy dudes shot him in and around his face. Is anyone curious what happened between the day when some morons flew planes into skyscrapers for Black Jesus (mohamed) and the day when another moron got capped? Apparently so because tons of folks bought the book and the movie’s currently #1 at the box office. Also, I hope the G got some cash for putting it out there that some employees were in trouble for leaking classified material. Great marketing.
But anyway, Zero Dark Thirty is kind of a cliffs notes of the hunting and killing of UBL (CIA term of endearment for dead face beardy). The tale is told in moments, ostensibly the handful of exciting moments over the 10 year hunt. A CIA noob (Jessica Chastain) becomes a veteran having done nothing but hunt UBL.
If you’re expressly familiar with all the reportable incidents from the war in Afghanistan and the hunt for UBL (unfortunately I am) you might be rather bored by the film. It’s not over the top. It’s not dramatized. (I assume it’s lightly dramatized to be slightly more exciting than actually working in intelligence, but the tone of the film is one of anti-drama) The story telling is deliberately asymmetrical to suggest reality; but the choice works for the film. Even if you’re dramatizing history, it is best to appear you aren’t unless your name is Quentin Tarantino (he’s 1 for 2 on quality and pissed off all of Russia and the nation of Islam with Inglorious Basterds[1] and Django Unchained[2] respectively). The tone is respectful to recent feelings and events and doesn’t try to play anything up or down.
There’s a vague suggestion America is pussy-assed for its reaction to its own torture program (true), but other than that there’s very little political message. Torture itself is portrayed as a pain in the ass. The man hours people put in to extracting information from the unwilling are daunting. But then without human confirmation of theories the intelligence community is deprived of the sureity politicians require for action. Paradox and all that.
But, I don’t give a fuck about torture (these whining assed terrorists should try to join the band at Florida A&M). So those scenes just suggested to me how shitty of a job it is to get information from people who don’t want to give it. I actually feel better if somebody from the CIA is beating the fuck out of a terrorist suspect somewhere that isn’t cleaned very often. THAT’S WHAT THEY’RE HERE FOR.
Anyway, I’m not sure what classified info was given up to make this film. I knew 90% of what was in the film already. I guess there was a super secret chopper they used, but it’d be really hard to reverse engineer one from its 18 minutes of screen time. I’ll not get in to the whole plot, but you probably know most of it. What you don’t know is how the assault on UBL’s compound went down. Looked fairly nerve wracking. Andy from Parks and Rec is good Navy Seal. They should have cast Ron Swanson as something.
What a rambling, incoherent review this is. Anyway, the film is decent and smacks of reality. It’s worth a watch. I’d see it before Django.