The Kingdom

Welcome to the first blog of the rest of your life. We're going to start this film related blog off with a bang.

Being the connected film tycoon that I am, I got into a prescreening of the film "The Kingdom", Peter Berg's new offering. I have been waiting for this film ever since I heard of it's existence. My friends, naysayers that they are, were all telling me I was getting my hopes up for no reason, that it would be a mediocre film at best. My friends are stupid.

The basic concept is that there is a compound of americans that gets bombed in Saudi Arabia, and an American FBI team is sent in to try and find those responsible. With intense results.

It was awesome. I couldn't even believe it. It certainly is not a film for the young or faint of heart, and definatly earns it's R rating for violence. I would argue that that's the power of films like this. It's no longer the cotton candy violence of James Bond, where killing is something you do at the drop of a hat. This film is viceral and messy. You can hardly believe what's happening as the end of the movie approaches. It's killing for a cause, and even so, it holds no glamour, the way it would be in real life, I would imagine.

There are a few spots where this film rings a little hollow; The montage of fathers playing with their children seemed a litttle forced, but it made sence to the plot, so it's a forgivable sin. The magor flaw, as with most studio pictures, is that it couldn't follow through, in a particular case. One of the team is captured, and is giong to be exicuted. They take their sweet time with a video of threats, he fights and breaks free for a bit, and the camera breaks for a second... just long enough for the team to save their comrade's life. How convient. They do kill off another one of the characters, as to not completely sell out, but still, it's kind of lame. But still, over all, this movie was very well done, save for those few little errors.

Jamie Foxx was well cast as was Chris Cooper. Jenn Garner was better than one would think she should be in this film. Jason Bateman as the snarky comedian was a slightly odd casting, but I enjoyed it. He seems kind of like he should be running the Bluth company rather than talking about bombs and shooting guns however. Fun nonetheless. And Tim Macgraw as the distraught husband of a woman killed in the attack was perfect. That man can play a man falling apart at the seams. For instance, Friday Night Lights as the drunken father, which insedently is another Berg film. Go figure..

I highly recommend this film for anyone who likes war/swat ish type films, or middle east political thrillers and isn't squeemish, as the last half hour gets a little intense.

Even my friend who went into the theatre not wanting to like it, loved it. I tink he may even like it more than I did. Go figure.

77%
Go see It!