Ridiculous, over-hyped, clichéd, inaccurate & grossly overrated.

Rating: 2/10 (27 March 2010)

I remember several years ago watching "Saving Private Ryan" with my grandfather, a WW2 vet, who also survived storming the beach that day. Ten minutes into the movie he had to leave the room, because of how "real & accurate" the beach scene was for him. I think i've made my point. Bigelow needs to learn from this kind of example. It's possible to recreate a scene/war realistically.
I have a few friends who have bravely served in Iraq, most, more than one tour of duty in infantry, tanker, equipment mechanic, etc., who put their lives in danger patrolling streets, dodging gunfire, detecting IED's, in some cases assisting to disarm and quarantine off areas, & processing the gruesome aftermath of an incident, or suicide bomber.
That being said, from the previews, & ridiculous hype, I figured this was going to be a no holds barred, gritty, realistic peek into the everyday life of American Soldiers more specifically, bomb tech soldiers.
I realized the inaccuracies start almost immediately, no skilled soldier in his right mind would've let that guy with the cell phone even start dialing...he would've been shot dead right away, IED units, patrolling alone, soldier wandering on vigilante mission alone in the night through dangerous Baghdad, are just some of the dangerous situations you can expect to see, glaring errors even to a non military observer.
No team leader would EVER risk the lives of his entire team plunging them into nighttime, uncharted territory "on a hunch" because he feels that whomever set up/detonated this nighttime bomb was surely hiding in the shadows watching. When in truth, they likely would've been long gone, blended in with the locals, if they were in the vicinity at all.
No team would've tolerated the rogue, "wild card" bomb tech, who repeatedly defies orders & odds, placing his entire team at risk, time & time again. In the words of my friends "would've zip tied his a** and thrown him in the back of a Hum Vee first." Do I need to go on? Ladies & Gentlemen, who else is going to know what's wrong with this picture more than the people who were there for real?
The main actors are clichéd cookie cutter cutouts. I found myself not caring about any of them as they meandered through the predictability of the movies as one cliché after another was rolled out: the various types of bombs, the shady terrorists, the doctor who is killed, ironically while on his first voyage out into the field, the angry by the books soldier, the "wild card", rule bending soldier, the innocent, sweet, soft spoken soldier. The done to death conversations and "coming to term" conversations. "By the books" soldier clashes with "Wild Card", but in the end, likes & respects him, despite his crazy methods, and realizes himself, he's overcome his fear of procreation, and indeed, wants children. "Wild Card" has trouble adjusting to civilian life, and in a dull scene, realizes he loves "one thing", which left me wondering, "is it war he loves?, or his son?"
Not one storyline is deep enough for me to give a crap what happened to any of them. Camera work is sloppy, & abrupt (not quite to Blair Witch levels, but irritating enough), if a director is going for a realistic camera situation, I think it's more important to not have to take Dramamine when watching it.
Ralph Fiennes & Guy Pearce also throw in a much too short cameo as apparently ridiculously inept British Officers, (their appearance subconsciously beckon you into wanting to watch a better film.) They of course are taken out by terrorist snipers occupying the only structure within eyesight.
The Academy needs a serious overhaul...it's absolutely shocking to me that this won "Best Picture". It's fine that someone wants to make a movie about the day to day of soldiers in Iraq, but for gods sake, at least make it accurate.
2 stars--for Fiennes & Pearce, & for the sets & locations...which are the best things about the movie.