MOVIE REVIEW: “The Kingdom”
“The Kingdom” (2007)
Directed by: Peter Berg
Written by: Matthew Michael Carnahan
Starring: Jamie Foxx, Chris Cooper, Jennifer Garner, Jason Bateman
***1/2 stars (out of ****)
Shot on locations in Washington D.C. and in the Emirate of Abu Dhabi. The movie opens with documentary footage of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia circa 1931, 1938, 1945, etc., and in the course of time it takes to run the credits, we have been given a brief history in black and white of Saudi Arabia and the U.S.’s connection to that history. Saudi Arabia becomes the number one producer of oil in the world and the United States becomes the number one consumer of oil in the world. All this leads to 9/11 and the fact that 14 of the 19 highjackers were Saudi’s.
This portion of the film is born from the gene pool that produced “Road Warrior” 27 years earlier. The “Road Warrior” runs it’s credits through black and white footage with a voice over describing the world’s blood lust for oil which ends in a nuclear apocalypse. The rest of that movie is the story of a small band of survivors with some amount of gasoline who are barricaded in a desert fortress fighting off the road warriors for control of remaining gasoline on earth.
“The Kingdom” is an updated version (sort of) set in the Middle East. It kind of reminds you of John Wayne’s “Green Beret,” but is far more three dimensional in its politics. The very last lines are subtitled with the terrorists and the American FBI points of view that add up to a poignant and very real point of view.
And, all the action and blood and bullets and bullet holes grab you the same way as “Black Hawk Down” did. It’s all good.
Love this cast: the Americans put together their FBI team of Jamie Foxx, Chris Cooper, Jennifer Garner, and Jason Bateman. In 1966 it was Burt Lancaster, Lee Marvin, Robert Ryan, and Woody Strode in the “Professionals.” In 1969 they were 'The Wild Bunch' played by William Holden, Ernest Borgnine, Warren Oates, and Ben Johnson. The Saudi Colonel Faris Al Ghazi is played by Ashraf Barhom. There’s more—the Saudi Sergeant, The Saudi Prince, and Barhom’s intensity just walk all over this film. He has tremendous ability to portray the restraint needed to deal with the FBI hot dogs who demand this, ask that, and push, push as if they are entitled creatures dropped from self-righteous heaven into a Muslim slumber party. His character could so quickly descend into condescending postures, but he never does. He is put into the impossible position of having to help the American FBI agents among his own people and simultaneously respect the cultural beliefs of his own culture of over 1500 years. It is a tight wire act. He is great at it. Barhom was in “Paradise Now” in 2005. I haven’t seen that yet but now I will. Barhom is something to behold.
Robert Nott in his October 5th review in the Pasatiempo (Santa Fe New Mexican newspaper) will tell you much more about the content of this film. I’ll leave all that to him. But I like this film!
