Green Zone

At first glance, looking at the posters for Paul Greengrass’ new thriller, Green Zone, you’d be forgiven for making the obvious yet incorrect assumption that this is simply ‘Bourne in Iraq’. In the months leading up to the film’s release this is certainly a presumption that has been commonly made by many, due to Greengrasses’ superb direction of the films talented and versatile leading man, Matt Damon, in both ‘The Bourne Supremacy’ and ‘The Bourne Ultimatum’. More than anything I believe, there was a great deal of hunger for this to be indeed just that, another Bourne film, as the notable success and praise for the film franchise is common knowledge. However, Green Zone does not follow the amnesiac assassin Jason Bourne, rather Damon plays chief warrant officer Roy Miller, a man in charge of tracking down W.M.D.’s in newly ‘liberated’ Iraq. Though the film was inspired by the book ‘Imperial Life in the Emerald City by Rajiv Chandrasekaran, Greengrass only really draws background information from the book and the two plots are entirely different.

It is now widely believed, if not agreed upon, that the justification for declaring war on Iraq in 2003, that of the supposed presence of Saddam Hussein’s weapons of mass destruction or W.M.D.’s as they became more well known in the subsequent months, was a false one and that despite assurances from the highest authorities within both the US and British Government, one thing is clear, there were no such weapons present.

Whether such intelligence was genuinely believed to have been true, or whether it was a combination of incompetence and deliberate fabrication to justify a war desired by the neocon’s present within America has been the subject of the most fiercely fought debates ever since. 7 years later in fact, Green Zone appears to be just as relevant, because I am writing this having only just heard the latest development in the Chilcott enquiry on the radio this morning, with a clearly exhausted Gordon Brown declaring once again that familiar statement of nearly all those responsible for 2003’s invasion, “It was the right decision and it was for the right reasons.”

Whether or not we choose to believe this is our own prerogative, however, the film does serve to keep open this mostly hotly debated of topics and make it more digestible for a larger audience, by supplanting the storyline with great action sequences, sure to satisfy men everywhere.

The film is shot like in the style Greengrass has become famous for, that of the handheld camera and although now getting somewhat predictable in his work, it serves as an effective way of multiplying the chaos on screen and building up the tension before the shot blossoms out into an all out battle visible from a distance. It will also inevitably draw comparisons with recent ‘Best Picture’ winner, Katherine Bigealow’s ‘The Hurt Locker’ and it is indeed shot by the same cinematographer, the talented Barry Ackroyd.

However, to prolong such a comparison any further than this, would be a mistake, as the two films are entirely different and whilst Katherine Bigealow focused on completely immersing us in the exploits of a bomb squad, Greengrasses’ political/action thriller has no such intention. As in most of Greengrasses’ work, the viewer is entirely immersed in these action sequences and there is an increased sense of realism to the action here that was perhaps slightly lacking in the sometimes crazy, though ethereal and high-octane sequences from the Bourne trilogy. We follow Miller (Damon) throughout newly ‘liberated’ Iraq as he attempts to track down W.M.D’S however, as he arrives at more and more locations, finding no weapons, locations he is assigned to secure are found empty, aside from year old pigeon excrement, a clear sign that there was and is nothing to find. Miller starts to question the intelligence given to him and as his team starts to sustain casualties in these pointless raids, he decides to speak out on what is becoming a costly waste of time.

Miller speaks out during a military briefing unable to contain his frustration any longer, however, is simply told in age-old military fashion, to keep his opinions to himself and ‘perform his duty’. However he is overheard, by CIA veteran Martin Brown, who indicates that the CIA (much like in real life events, if we are to believe what we are told) were cut out of the loop and that they do not have the intelligence to back up the claims of W.M.D’s.

What subsequently ensues is Matt Damon going on a journey to uncover the truth behind the pointless raids, he is being ordered to go on and his attempts to discover where the initial fabrication of the truth over the presence of such weapons originated. Greengrass combines this plot with solid action sequences and Matt Damon’s gives another convincing performance, as the likable, handsome, mislead officer attempting to uncover the truth behind what he realizes is a larger conspiracy. Damon’s earns credibility in this role due to his earlier turn as Jason Bourne and due to the similarity of his general role within the film, as a viewer he is instantly believable. Perhaps the unlikely star of the movie however, is Greg Kinnear, usually known for his ‘nice guy’ roles, Kinnear plays the films antagonist U.S. intelligence agent Poundstone and is terrific at portraying a man filled with malice and fueled by his own mislead idealism. Though the film will inevitably draw criticism from those who still believe the 7-year-old justification for war was valid and necessary, Greengrass has produced an effective thriller, using Damon as his reliable lead actor.

Though the film may not be up to the very high standards of his earlier work, with Jason Bourne, the film functions effectively, both as a political thriller and an action packed film and thus will satisfy a broad array of movie going audiences.