AP-Events in Iraq Last week
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When the Iraq war was in its infancy, a few of us thought naively that we'd be out of there as soon as the parade was over. We would put aside our earlier misgivings, pat ourselves on the back, and say "We won the war." Forget it.
Now, we find ourselves heading toward five years with no end in sight and here come the movies. Amazing...
The war is still going on and we have all sorts of ink which is a little more acceptable than movies, yet baffling to those of us who tried to publish Vietnam stories for years to no avail.
It was years before the writing market opened up and Vietnam didn't find any real movie audience before 79' with Deer Hunter(1979) and the satire, Apocalypse Now.
I guess it's a sign of the times. There's already been a slew of documentaries and I just saw a heart rendering one about wounded Iraqi war vets on HBO hosted by James Gandolfini(Tony Soprano) . Later on this year comes a movie about the rape of a 14 year old Iraqi girl by American soldiers, Redacted. Who's going to want to see this movie? Muslims?
I doubt these new movies will look favorably at our involvement in Iraq. Robert Redford, both writer and actor in one of the coming attractions, Lions For Lambs, hardly will. From what I've read, his movie wants to give movie goers a chance to engage in dialogue. OK?
Another one has to do with an FBI counterterrorism unit called The Kingdom and then there is Grace Is Gone starring John Cusack as a stay at home spouse whose wife goes to war and doesn't come back. Now, that is going to drive you to the movies.
SHOW ME THE MONEY
Hollywood is always about money, and established actors like Redford like to make movies with a message.
I'm still a little in doubt about it all. My real feeling is that these movies are not going to do very well overall. I'm not sure that people want to engage viscerally on Iraq; it is not like the war has ended and the movies can paint a picture of what happened. We don't know yet.
ENTERTAINMENT VS. REALITY
Movie goers want to be entertained not beat up with reality. Going to the movies for entertainment and getting political statements, I don't know.
We have some past evidence: I saw United 93, which I thought was super, but it was not very popular. Clint's Letters from Iwo Jima and Flags of Our Fathers didn't knock anybody's financial socks off. And, even now, Ken Burns is getting beaucoup face time for his documentary, The War. Maybe, enough already.
I think most of Hollywood is pretty much anti-Bush and will probably try to convey the war as Bush's war. Using a movie as a way to protest or as Redford claims, maybe to educate, might be over reaching. Whether or not moviegoers will go for it, we'll have to wait and see.
Watching the Iraq war as a movie seems a little unseemly. Out of every war comes thousands and thousands of stories, most remain untold. But, to try to tell even a few of them while the real war is happening seems somewhat misplaced. We don't have to see a movie about Iraq. The tragedy of it is right in front of us. KT
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