Should have been better.

Rating: 6/10 (3 February 2013)

The protagonist Maya was recruited by the CIA straight out of college. This is unusual. She's supposed to be a 'killer' when it comes to her analytical abilities.
There is no dialogue or action she takes that suggest this. She is very ordinary, can be rude and abrupt but she is determined.
I would have expected the film to have described an extraordinarily bright character who we might admire and warm to, after all she succeeds in a male dominated world - the CIA and the Middle East?
The torture scenes are not gross, squalid or shocking. Not very real or nasty. They could have given great contrast to the safe office environments Maya and we are used to.
We see a few stupid things like a trusted Bin Laden courier who apparently exhibits good evasive trade-craft, but drives one vehicle all the time, a car that we are told is unusual for that area and so stands out and also has a reg plate where its first three letters are easily remembered, IDFIsraeli Defense Force?
A long seeked for enemy is driven across desert by a comrade to a US base where a CIA team wait to question him. Apparently if he and his car are searched at the perimeter they might spook him and they don't want to frighten him off. He's allowed through unchecked and they detonate the inevitable bomb in the car or on their person, killing some key CIA personnel. Why didn't the checkpoint search the car?!! The enemy had nowhere to run to even if they were spooked, the camp was in the middle of a desert and he relied on a walking stick! Would senior CIA operatives stand by the car to greet the arrivals or step well back and allow the US soldiers to search them? Just wrong.
The SEAL team infiltration is really exciting as their stealth helicopters fly low through the mountain terrain. We watch them very slowly infiltrate the compound which is great cinema but I couldn't help wondering if they really are this slow?
Most of the film though is slow and if done well could have created great tension as we approach the time for the raid but really this part of the film doesn't do that. It's a bit monotonous just like Maya.
I liked the film but with such interesting subject matter it should have been better.