Lovesusti The Worst Film Ever

Pacionsbo Absolutely Fantastic

IncaWelCar In truth, any opportunity to see the film on the big screen is welcome.

Cheryl A clunky actioner with a handful of cool moments.

Theo Robertson On the 12th of March 2006 five American soldiers of the 101st Airborne walked in to a house outside the village of Yusufiyah in Iraq and murdered a mother , a father and a six year old child . After this they took turns to rape the fourteen year old daughter before killing her . This crime became known The Mumudiya Killings . This shocking crime was later turned in to a compelling book by Jim Frederick entitled Black Hearts in 2010 . Three years prior to this Brian DePalma made a highly fictionalised account called REDACTED DePalma doesn't seem an obvious choice for this type of story since he has a highly idiosyncratic camera style . That said he did make CASUALTIES OF WAR which was thematically very similar to this REDACTED though be it set in Vietnam rather than Iraq . The director's cinematic style is entirely different from what we've been used to for many years . Here instead of a camera voyeuristic moving around we have a cinema verite style complete with internet clips and a cast involving unknown actors ad-libbing The unfortunate thing is that DePalma seems way out of his depth . He fails to develop the story in anyway . Reading the Frederick's book you're aware of the brutality B Company 501st Infanrty Regiment 101st Airborne Division were experiencing with a casualty rate similar to that experienced during the Second World War . Regardless of your opinion of the war ( I was against it ) it is essential reading for the often incomprehensible nature of an insurgency conflict . REDACTED fails to give anything about the background or the context of what might have led to this type of atrocity against innocent civilians . The platoon in question see one of their comrades killed but apart from that there's no real inciting incident , there's no real character motivation and that's the fundamental failing of the film The second major failing is that the actors are fairly dreadful but I should qualify this by saying it's almost certainly not their fault because their characters have the depth of rice paper . None of this is helped by having to spontaneously spout dialogue off the top of their heads . Make no mistake you can see DePalma shouting through a loudhailer" okay you're a soldier in Iraq so pretend you're in a war-zone and ... ACTION " . This type of acting style might work in British social dramas but not in a plot driven American war film and it shows This is a very sensitive , harrowing subject matter for a film and it deserves some reverence to say the least. It's almost certain if this film is to go by that DePalma was against the war in Iraq and it's perhaps not surprising that many people who have praised REDACTED are similarly against the invasion. Regardless of my own politics I can only comment on it as a movie fan and this is a fairly poor film . One can only hope that if Hollywood get round to adapting Black Hearts they can do the full story justice for the sake of fourteen year old Abeer Qasim Hamza and her family in a conflict that saw aid workers being decapitated on the internet by insurgents

LydiaOLydia I'm sorry, but I'm left of Lenin liberal. I am against the war and how it is propagated, and am aghast at the heavy handed, insensitive tactics and attitude of the US soldiers that I've witnessed in Iraq.however, this movie doesn't depict that. Rather, it represents the US soldier as a one dimensional cartoon, stupid beyond stupid. The caricature can only appeal to ardent anti-Americans (as we have seen in these comments) and utterly repel people who might otherwise have an open mind (as we've also seen in these comments). One soldier actually says "Waxing hajis is like stepping on cockroaches." I'm sorry - that simply does not happen and has not happened. The Americans are a lot of things, but cold blooded psychopaths is not one of them. However, the movie doesn't stop there - it turns them into criminal pedophile rapists too.If the acting and script were much much much better than they are, the film might just pass for insightful satire - much like Apocalypse now "overdid" the Vietnam war to draw attention to its absurdities and its effects on the psyche of all involved. However, this movie fails miserably in these aims. The actors are awful - just awful. They don't resemble US soldiers in physical appearance or mannerisms. Each one screams "low budget, effeminate Hollywood extra." It doesn't help that the script turns them into the most cardboard of caricatures. Honestly, at some point I expected them to start eating kittens.The political message it tries to make is needed and all in all decent. However, the acting stinks and the script is poorly written so that it just comes across as so very staged and fake.This movie has been deservedly forgotten. "Three Kings", which is about the first Persian gulf war, ironically is still the best movie as of this writing about the second Persian gulf war even though the second of course started years after "three kings" was made. Such is the paucity on quality film on the Iraq War (and, before you think anything, I thought "Hurt Locker" was pretty awful too).

HungryHebbo I'm not going to give a massive in depth review of the film as I don't have the words or ability to do so. However, I can say that I did enjoy it as a film, very powerful and moving.One thing that I MUST recommend that people do though, especially everyone saying that 'It's not an accurate representation of the military', or 'It's just one sided gibberish' or criticisms of such ilk is to read 'Black Hearts' by Jim Frederick. Basically, the film is a dramatised version of this book, which gives a very frank and honest (in my opinion anyway) breakdown and description of the situation that these soldiers were facing, and had faced. I say fair play to the film for just dumping the viewer in the middle of the story. Why should there be a massive lengthy background detailing each and every character's history? If anything, something like that is just insulting the viewer's intelligence in such matters. The film is not saying that 'Waa, army people are bad', think about the situation for a minute.

John Monty The director just shown a damn dare. The camera work is horrible. I don't like to see a movie which seems like tapped on a handy-cam. Its kinda weird to watch a movie on a fixed angle, and without any camera motion.More or less, the movie doesn't have any story. I expected it to be a high voltage fighting action movie as its poster seems like US army on a action. But... I only found few bullshit butts all around the movies.Finally how come a handicapped person became a soldier at US army at this movie? His behavior sounds so much irritating to me. My god... a sick person as a army soldier???