The Hurt Locker

It's a mystery to me how this brilliant flick didn’t get a wider audience response. What Stone's Platoon meant for an "alternative look" at the Vietnam conflict, Kathryn Bigelow's film means for the current U.S. Army mission in Iraq, and for its guys, who are there trembling for their lives and counting each day until the end of their tour of duty. The film doesn't moralise, it doesn't lecture, it just offers blood, sweat, frustration, the dust of Iraqi roads, fear of death and general paranoia, where even an Iraqi with a camera can be a potential terrorist. Not since Mendes's Jarhead has there been such a good military-themed film. (13/05/2009)

Let’s make a war movie based on Kathryn Bigelow: We’ll create a setting for a scene and flesh out the location to the last detail. We'll spend the rest of the day explaining to eighty extras what they're supposed to be doing in that location and that they're not supposed to notice the strange people with cameras running around. At the end, we'll put the lead actors on the first marker and explain which way to go and what to do. If a cameraman brings a stabilizer or, heaven forbid, a tripod on set, he'll have 10% of his salary docked. Repeat seven times and we have a feature film. The Hurt Locker could have been perfect if it hadn't stumbled on two things. On a second viewing, we already know that all of the film's visual attributes have been exhausted in the first scene, and from there on the film repeats an established routine. Secondly, despite all sincere efforts, the catharsis comes only in individual scenes through their denouement, but there is no way left to clean up the corners of the whole construct. I wouldn't want to be Cameron coming home from the studio where he's spending his third summer and being told by his old lady: "Tea, where have you been? I put the Oscar on the fireplace, if you don't mind. I'll tell you, that year in Jordan, when we were filming that Hurt Locker, it was hell. I caught dysentery from falafel six times. Yeah, and I went shopping today and I forgot which cornflakes you like. So I grabbed the ones closest to hand. Can you believe they had a whole rack of fucking cornflakes...?" (05/03/2010)

I can't say that this award-winning Oscar drama knocked me off my feet, and it won't make it into my top war movies either, as it lacks a cohesive plotline, and the characters, except for the main protagonist, are merely sketched out. It's a depiction of several fragmented scenes from the operations of a unit focused on neutralizing explosives. The authenticity in capturing the overall atmosphere in Baghdad and war-torn Iraq can definitely be appreciated. In comparison to Kathryn Bigelow's film, Hollywood's so-called war movies, like for example Three Kings, seem rather awkward. However, the authenticity of individual scenes and the protagonist's experiences are not all that magnificent. In reality, playing it safe and adhering to caution is much more common, and a soloist indulging in adrenaline would not be understood by their unit colleagues, and especially not by their superiors. I estimate that they would've earned themselves an end to their mission at least three times due to their escapades. American units are specialized and usually call in the appropriate special forces to handle extraordinary situations, so pyrotechnics specialists interfering with the work of snipers or clearing adjacent sectors of terrorists is pure fiction. Another aspect to appreciate in this drama is the absence of the usual patriotic pathos, clichés, and above all, political correctness. Kathryn Bigelow also avoids unnecessary naturalistic repulsiveness, as war in her interpretation is stress, fatigue, constant tension, dirt, and waiting for the end of the mission. Overall impression: 80%. (01/04/2010)

The individual sequences are adrenaline packed and Kathryn Bigelow does a good enough job with the “will it explode or not” dilemma to push the viewer into their seat through the simple movements around the mise-en-scène. Unfortunately, the episodic scenes of the life of an elite unit are pasted together in an attempt at a story where the emotions don’t work due to the weak profiling of the characters, while the attempt at a moral insight is not very successful either. It is realistic, probably (fortunately, I can’t judge), but the constantly shaky camera doesn’t work as ingeniously as in other films and actually disrupts the leisurely built atmosphere of an environment where every movement is dangerous. Jeremy Renner’s performance keeps things afloat, providing the viewer some depth they can hold on to. 65% (04/05/2020)

Quite intimate and unfortunately often also quite uninspiring. It has some truly revolutionary elements and some already seen a hundred times over. In the end, it’s average. A big plus is the fact that Bigelow doesn't lean towards any side. she works as an observer and doesn't add or subtract anywhere, and that’s not very easy – none of the great war movies I can think are 50-50. The sound design is excellent, and will surely be appreciated by connoisseurs and home cinema owners. The sniper exhibition and explosions are especially outstanding. The psychology is average, I expected more. Considering that the competitor was a pleasant, although relatively conceptually stale Avatar, I quite understand the Oscars. (04/04/2010)