come anticipate SYRIANA with me

My understanding is that it kinda is. Isn't it a fictionalized (to protect the innocent, assumedly) retelling of a nonfiction book?

I liked the reveal on that in the movie, actually. At the very end, when you're nearly emotionally devastated anyway, they tell you that this is based on a non-fiction book, which lets you know at the last moment that these events aren't as fantastical as you would probably like to leave the theater thinking.

I dunno about that, but I do think that how confusing it is has definitely been overstated.

I agree fully with Raymond on this. I wonder about people who would lay into Syriana too much, though. I mean, how many mainstream films treats the audience with as much respect. Not the best movie I've seen, and I do wonder how much of it was cut. But you've got to appreciate the effort, no?

(A friend left the theatre stating that she felt like she had to do some research.)

Also, this was from Ebert's syndicated column from a couple of weeks ago regarding the "corruption speech":

Corruption and greed in America

December 11, 2005

Q. I have read more than one review mentioning Tim Blake Nelson's "brilliant" speech about corruption in "Syriana." The speech has been compared to Michael Douglas' speech in "Wall Street" (1987) that defends greed. I haven't seen the movie yet but I'd love to just be able to read the speech.

Greg Nelson, Chicago

A. The speech is the work of Stephen Gaghan, the Oscar-winning writer and director of the film. Nelson plays Danny Dalton, a Texas oilman, who is speaking to Bennett Holiday (Jeffrey Wright), a lawyer investigating a merger of two oil companies. Gaghan supplies this transcript:

Danny: Some trust fund prosecutor, got off-message at Brown, thinks he's gonna run this up the flagpole, make a name for himself, maybe get elected some two-bit, no-name congressman from nowhere, with the result that Russia or China can suddenly start having, at our expense, all the advantages we enjoy here. No, I tell you. No, sir. (mimics prosecutor) "But, Danny, these are sovereign nations." Sovereign nations! What is a sovereign nation, but a collective of greed run by one individual? "But, Danny, they're codified by the U.N. charter!" Legitimized gangsterism on a global basis that has no more validity than an agreement between the Crips and the Bloods! (Beat) ... Corruption charges. Corruption? Corruption ain't nothing more than government intrusion into market efficiencies in the form of regulation. That's Milton Friedman. He got a goddamn Nobel Prize. We have laws against it precisely so we can get away with it. Corruption is our protection. Corruption is what keeps us safe and warm. Corruption is why you and I are prancing around here instead of fighting each other for scraps of meat out in the streets. (Beat) Corruption ... is how we win.

Or when Christopher Plummer meets Clooney in the cafe, it's the middle of the night, he's a bit disheveled but has put on cufflinks. Like that's his reassurance to himself that he's the powerful one, the one in charge, despite his house having just been broken into.

I thought Damon's character was terrific, the way his desperation following the loss of his son was channeled into devotion to the Prince. People rarely just spiral downwards I think; they grab onto something and let it carry them down.

haha yes the one with NO IRANIANS.

i thought these moments were a bit "writerly" and didn't work for me

but much of the stuff about the suicide bomber was pretty searing, if only because i've never seen it before

thought this film was very smart, visually as well as uh narratively

His immediate bosses sent him there to assassinate Nasir because they were told he's funding terrorists. They don't know this to be false. Right?

Someone above them gave them the info in hopes of disposing with the problematic Nasir. Dean Whiting (Christopher Plummer) maybe has something to do with this?

Or was he clooney there to be killed by that guy who ripped his fingernails out? William hurt said the nail ripper had flipped and now worked for iran - while clooney was under the impression that he was still a us asset. It seemed like the nail ripper was an old contact of clooney's, rather than someone the cia had set him up with specifically for the nasir job. In which case it's unlikely he was double crossed.

Also - who exactly is Dean Whiting? An oil man with deep government connections?

Please help.

So the plot wasn't really very complicated, it was just that it was flimsily communicated enough for it to seem so.

I'm sure I'd enjoy it more on a second viewing, not having to miss the forest for concentrating on the trees, but yeah, it annoyed me.

I am rubbish with faces and names though.

Actually, earlier on I finally saw Good Night, And Good Luck and was excited to recognise the evil bumming one from Prison Break as an evil McCarthyite. I made an especial effort to remember his character's name so that I could check I was right when I got home. It was Donald, so I thought of a duck. Johnny Mnemonic, me. I'm going to check it now, in fact.

Woah! That was Robert Downey Jr.

Anyway, hang on - doesn't this only work if other characters adopt this same protocol when referring to them?

I didn't hear any lines like: "I'm sorry, but that's not going to cut it with the Department of Justice – we need bigger fish than that dude from all the Coen Bros movies."

*SPOILER ALERT*

when clooney halts the convoy with the white flag, is what subsequently happens part of his plan?

is damon's switching of cars a suggestion he suspects what is ahead, or totally innocent?

i am more confused now.

this was rubbish.

maybe it would have been an okay mini-series, but it tried to do way too much.

anyway 'the kingdom' isn't great but it is at least a film. don't think 'syriana' is really more intelligent either. it's just that clooney talks a good game and has earned liberal credentials for saying that mccarthy was a bad dude.

the kingdom was one of the worst movies i ever seen

reading upthread 1) make it a miniseries is a meme already 2) the corruption speech is good.

I thought it was good. It was almost exactly the same film as Any Given Sunday in many ways. Matt Damon was the best thing in it. Weirdly.

better than traffic

syriana was great. traffic and the kingdom sucked balls bigtime.

traffic is bad but at least made an effort at characterization. it had a complex plot but ideas-wise it wasn't that complicated.

it had convenient color-coding

in this film the doctor from deep space nine gets blowed up

with a doctor from ER

who previously teamed up with the country singer in a movie about odysseus

while the kid from GWH watches his family implode

and america runs on gas

the end

Syriana has neither Benicio del Toro bargaining with the feds while floating in a pool, nor teenage crackheads - ergo it cannot be superior to Traffic in any way.

The Kingdom would have been a lot better had it been an actual Michael Mann film instead of trying to be intelligent and CSI-y. Jamie Foxx and Chris Cooper runnin' and gunnin' through Saudi Arabia would have been enough.

Chris Cooper is criminally underused, actually. Both of his awesome lines are in the trailer. Fuck that.

if they'd shot 'the kingdom' like 'miami vice' and had more terseness i'd be happy as larry, fuck the politics.

the actual investigationy bits were pretty weak. and i couldn't work out if the bad guys at the end were in cahoots with the national guard guy all along etc, which wouldn't have mattered if it'd been more like 'heat'.