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A U.S. soldier (Matt Damon) goes rogue to find weapons of mass destruction in Paul Greengrass’ action film “Green Zone.” |
Matt Damon’s muscular and fast-moving action film “The Green Zone” may be marketed as an Iraq war thriller, but it’s really a classic example of revisionistic wish fulfillment.
Just as Sylvester Stallone’s John Rambo and Chuck Norris’ Colonel Braddock re-fought the Vietnam War to fulfill our wishes of victory, Damon’s chief warrant officer performs a similar task in Iraq.
We wish there had been someone in America – anyone – with the smarts and critical thinking skills to see through the government’s elaborate scam of the nonexistent weapons of mass destruction, and go public with the truth.
In routine Hollywood movies, this person would be played by a fearless, skeptical journalist risking his/her life on the front lines of danger.
But the watchdogs of the mainstream American news media were too busy enjoying their safe status as embedded lap dogs. (“Green Zone” features a Wall Street Journal reporter who falls into lock-step with the administration’s war drums. Later, she feels really bad about it.)
So, “The Green Zone” gives us a fearless and skeptical U.S. soldier who not only serves as a stand-in for the detective/investigative reporter character, he gives Jason Bourne a run for his nausea-inducing, whip-panned, shaky-cam action sequences.
Chief Warrant Officer Roy Miller (a Bourne-again Damon) suspects something fishy in Iraq soon after the 2003 U.S. invasion when his squad secures three locations where WMD are supposed to be, but they find nothing. (Read more…)