An excellent production

Rating: 9/10 (6 June 2013)

The sound of war
The Hurt Locker is an American film set in a middle-East war setting. Throughout the film we follow sergeant Jeremy Renner, substitute for squad leader Matt Thompson as head of a team designated to disarm high- threat bombs around the country of Iraq. During missions squad members Sanborn and Elridge communicate with James as he approaches targets in a highly protective bomb suit. Loving the adrenaline of the job, some might call James crazy for his approach to certain situations, scaring his squad members and being rather reckless.
The Hurt Locker was according to us the best Iraq war film made. We think it also has one of the best portrayals of the senselessness, brutality and randomness that comes with fighting in a war. These are all the aspects that made this movie win 6 Oscars. We liked the fact that they didn't put movie stars or well-known actors in the movie as this made it very convincing. It's just about a small group of men disarming bombs in the heat of the battle, when there is no one else they can count on. Everything can be deadly in those kinds of situations and everyone can be an enemy, their lives are at risk all the time. The plot in the film is great, the atmosphere is even better, everything seemed like it was filmed by a soldier fighting in Iraq in real life. Another good thing about the film was that lots of underlying themes, such as chaos, came back in for example the character James Renner (for example the scene when he stops a vehicle when he is mounted in his bomb defusing gear), the squad leader. The chaos came back because of his reckless approach to doing his work. The fact that they make you feel that you are the fourth member of the squad is also an amazing experience throughout the film. We could really imagine that we were part of the squad because of the quality of the acting, and because they filmed big parts of the movie from eye height, It was also the 360 landscape that made our imagination possible, 360 landscape meaning that you can only hear one character talking at the time, making you feel like you are on the battlefield yourself (this was shown very clearly in the opening scene, where you can hear the heartbeat of the bomb diffuser. The last thing we really liked about the movie was that it is very close to reality (apart from the recklessness of the squad leader); they created this by, for example, putting in the scenes that were in between the action scenes. When you're watching a war film nowadays most of the times the only thing you can see is blood, they found a good balance between the two with the usage of well-written characters and dialogue.
The Hurt Locker has made great use of cinematic techniques. First of all, the narrative form is very clear. This is because fabula and syuzhet are synced and because there weren't any flashbacks or flash forwards in film, this made the film "easy" to watch. At first, we thought that there would be an open ending because most modern day "serious" movies end with this "annoying" ending that leaves lots and lots of questions with the viewer. So you can imagine we were pretty delighted with the closed ending in this film. Second of all, we unanimous agreed that the mise and scene was performed brilliantly, the acting was astonishing and made us believe we were like the "4th squad member". The setting, namely Iraq was convincing, because these situations occur daily in the Middle East. Thirdly, we thought that the camera-work was done really well, especially because of the eye height filming and of the first person view that was used at certain moments. We especially enjoyed these techniques because it amplifies the feeling that you're the "4th squad member". The filter they used; a sand like colour, gave it a sort of Middle East atmosphere. Fourthly, the light and colour completed the film, just like the sound, the producers made sure that the light and color was "natural" and "organic". Fifthly, the film producers did a great job on the special effects, the explosions and gunfire seemed amazingly realistic. Sixthly, the editing was flawless. All the gun shots, foot steps, explosions etc. were perfectly synced. At last, we have the sound. It's not surprising that the Hurt Locker has won already 2 Oscars for just the Sound in the film. The 360 landscape sound technique (stated earlier) amplifies the "4th squad member idea". Sound and image relations were also (like all the other techniques) perfectly synced. The dialogue was very well written and together with the language made a very convincing film.
Overall we think the hurt locker is an amazing film, giving a very good representation of the problems American soldiers face in the middle- east. The message is clear: life of a soldier is hard. Kate Bigelow did an excellent job in terms of dialogue and character development: all characters in the film have seemingly been very polished creating a very convincing story. Cinematic techniques are applied almost excellently: there's a wide variety of sound –and special effects, good usage of light and colour and good editing. Flaws were scarce in this film. After reviewing what we had seen we came to the conclusion this was close to our ''perfect'' film, which is most likely also the reason it won so many Oscars. Therefore we recommend this film to all, it has a good balance of tension, dialogue and action.