Review: Green Zone

(2 votes, average: 3.00 out of 5)

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In 2007 director Paul Greengrass, along with actor Matt Damon gave us one of the best action movies in decades and one of the greatest films of the last 10 years. Well, with their latest collaboration, Green Zone takes what made the Bourne films so amazing and applies it to a real word setting and the film is better because of it.

Set at the beginning of the 2003 Iraq war, Green Zone takes the audience through the journey of weapons specialist Roy Miller who has begun to question the intelligence reports he has been receiving about Weapons of Mass Destruction. The reason for the curiosity comes from weeks of searching the sites givin to him that are being called “sure things” and coming up empty each and every time for WMD’s.

It’s hard enough to even talk in passing about the subject of why the US went to war with Iraq in 2003, but add on to that a story that makes finding WMD’s not only a priority, but a necessity, then you have the makings for a film that truly knows how to touch the audience on a deep level (especially if that audience is American).

Even though Green Zone is full of deep underlying meaning and message, it never looses sight of the action/thriller genre it exists within. If I could sum up that portion of the film is one sentence, I would call it a more condensed Bourne Ultimatum minus the espionage. The thriller elements of the film never get dull and thanks to some extremely tight editing, you never forget what the main objective of the story is.

As far as action goes, it’s nothing short of perfect. Done in the classic Greengrass documentary feel that the Bourne films were in, Green Zone packs a punch of foot chases, gun fights, and exploding helicopters to make any action fan giddy with excitement.

There will be those who question the story of some of the side characters, but, when you look at them not as characters that are meant to hold themselves up, but rather characters meant to push Miller’s character, then they become completely different and understandable people.

It’s hard enough to make an action film that manages to pull away from the stereotype. But add on to that a political message about the dangers of false intelligence and the search for the ultimate power (in this case WMD), then you will have achieved something truly great. At least for this reviewer, this is a perfect film is every way without a single dull moment. It is a shame this film was released in March because Green Zone has summer release written all over it. As of now, this is the film to beat for best of 2010 and possibly this decade.

10/10