Restrepo
Best film on war I have seen in a theater. It is a documentary, but has the emotional power of a feature film. Having been in combat and having been in Afghanistan with an Army platoon (before I went to Iraq) I felt Restrepo captured it all very well.
I cannot compare Restrepo to Generation Kill miniseries since I co-wrote the scripts and was involved in the production and therefore have no objectivity. But I will say if you liked Gen Kill miniseries or found it informative, you will probably like Restrepo. It's about a different war and it uses real footage (not actors and sets) but goes after some of the same truths about a small band of troops that we were pursuing in Gen Kill.
While Hurt Locker was a good action film, I saw few truths in it about war, or the war in Iraq. The actions of the soldiers in Hurt Locker were mostly ridiculous and unrealistic. (I do like the scene in Hurt where Jeremy Renner returns home and has a sort of epiphany at the supermarket that he doesn't fit in to the civilian world. That's the one scene that clicked for me.) Though I didn't feel Hurt was a good war film, the article which inspired it--"The Man in the Bomb Suit" by screenwriter Mark Boal--is solid journalism.
I hope that the public does connect with Restrepo. People in the US are pretty disconnected from what's going on in Afghanistan. They have opinions, but often little understanding of the war that their nation is fighting (and in which Afghans and Europeans, as well as Americans, are shedding their blood for every day). Restrepo could help redress that ignorance. It's also a fine piece of art.
http://www.ifc.com/news/2010/06/doc-d...
I cannot compare Restrepo to Generation Kill miniseries since I co-wrote the scripts and was involved in the production and therefore have no objectivity. But I will say if you liked Gen Kill miniseries or found it informative, you will probably like Restrepo. It's about a different war and it uses real footage (not actors and sets) but goes after some of the same truths about a small band of troops that we were pursuing in Gen Kill.
While Hurt Locker was a good action film, I saw few truths in it about war, or the war in Iraq. The actions of the soldiers in Hurt Locker were mostly ridiculous and unrealistic. (I do like the scene in Hurt where Jeremy Renner returns home and has a sort of epiphany at the supermarket that he doesn't fit in to the civilian world. That's the one scene that clicked for me.) Though I didn't feel Hurt was a good war film, the article which inspired it--"The Man in the Bomb Suit" by screenwriter Mark Boal--is solid journalism.
I hope that the public does connect with Restrepo. People in the US are pretty disconnected from what's going on in Afghanistan. They have opinions, but often little understanding of the war that their nation is fighting (and in which Afghans and Europeans, as well as Americans, are shedding their blood for every day). Restrepo could help redress that ignorance. It's also a fine piece of art.
http://www.ifc.com/news/2010/06/doc-d...
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Thanks for your thoughtful comment. Well put.e
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It is great to hear your feedback on the movie Restrepo. I saw this just last week, and I have to say it was very moving and intense. Like Generation Kill, it takes the audience along in a powerful way, with all the situations these men face on their mission in Afghanistan. It was a movie which left us with respect and a better understanding of these soldiers, as well as much sadness also for every innocent civilian unfortunately caught up in this war.