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The Kingdom
Reviewed by Theo Michelfeld
Posted: October 1, 2007

Whether or not America is ready for popcorn flicks about the war on terror, Hollywood apparently is. It wasn’t so many years ago we were tip-toeing through those first politically neutral Saturday Night Live skits in the wake of 9/11. But soon afterwards, terrorism-themed episodes of Law & Order and The West Wing began airing on the small screen, and without noticeable resentment from the audience. In 2005, Hollywood tested the waters with the Desert Storm film Jarhead, and with the cerebral and strictly popcorn-free Syriana. And finally, last year, the memories of 9/11 were directly confronted by a pair of films, United 93 and World Trade Center.

This year, filmmakers continued to explore the casualties of our violent times with the sophisticated and outstanding film A Mighty Heart, as well as the sloppy but sincere Reign Over Me. But amidst this gradual and delicate process, something suddenly indelicate made its way to the silver screen in 2007. It was a scene in Michael Bay’s Transformers, in which American soldiers in Qatar were beset and annihilated by camouflaged robots from outer space. This sequence was, for me, an unwelcome confection of current events and Hollywood escapism. But considering the lack of viewer backlash (unless you call $315 million at the box office a statement of disapproval) Americans didn’t object one bit to Transformers. And so it would seem we are game for anything.

Which brings us to the heavily advertised new film The Kingdom. By traditional standards of storytelling and filmmaking, this is a terrific movie. And if anyone, including the filmmakers, could pretend this picture was nothing more than a good action yarn, it would be simple enough to appreciate The Kingdom for its thrills, its acting, its dialogue, and its craftsmanship in general. But this film, despite its movie star heroes, snappy one-liners, and arcade game ending, doesn’t want to be viewed as mere escapist entertainment. This film wants it all.

The Kingdom begins with a mesmerizing prologue in which the complex and troubled alliance between the U.S. and Saudi Arabia is explained from scratch. It ends with a poetic and effective statement about the endless cycle of violence into which our country has wandered. And in between it features wicked and reasonable Muslim characters, a gentle montage of Saudis at home with their families, wide-eyed innocent children of U.S. and Saudi descent, a merciless terrorist attack on a U.S. compound in Riyadh, FBI agents teaching The Middle East a thing or two about crime scene investigation, the considerable drama of mutual international distrust, the considerable drama of international cooperation, a bomb-making sequence and some very unsettling preparations for a video-taped beheading, Jamie Foxx smooth-talking a Saudi prince, gun battles in the city streets, Jennifer Garner being more woman than her Arab hosts can handle, Americans kicking ass in general, and Jason Bateman cracking wise in his Orioles baseball cap.

The point being this: There is a dicey combination of tried-and-true Hollywood formula and all-too dead-serious real world subject matter in this film. The Kingdom walks its fine line with frequent remarkable dexterity. But the dueling sensibilities do, at times, undermine each other, most notably during the climax, in which the villains don black hoods, open fire from the rooftops, and turn their so-called “Kingdom” into The Wild West. This film never pretends to illustrate the challenges our soldiers face in Iraq, but it certainly does dare itself to be taken on poetic terms. And for a movie about the war on terror, this conclusion to affairs comes across as playing to our nearly antiquated excellence at direct military confrontation. A firefight may make for good cinema, and guerilla warfare is part of the reality we face over there. But it doesn’t feel, anymore, like a solution to our Middle East crisis.

All of that acknowledged, The Kingdom is also, on some level, merely a good action yarn, and not necessarily an implausible one. And by the way, although the patriotic viewer will likely be inclined to support this film, a movie about American heroics in The Middle East is not necessarily propagandistic, any more than a film about our international misdeeds would necessarily be enlightening. America is more-than-ready for a film like this. But how well The Kingdom ages will be interesting to see. Twenty years from now, will it be seen as a cool, politically-themed action film? Or will it come across as a sad bit of cinematic wishful thinking? That will depend, I suppose, on what really goes on, between now and then, with our violent little planet, and the fragile, fanatical, greedy species that owns it.

Copyright © 2007 Theo Michelfeld