Obviously this film divides viewers...

Rating: 9/10 (21 March 2013)

...which, historically, a lot of the best films do.
For me, this film has two unusual qualities;
1) Its greatest weakness is also its greatest strength. It takes pains to keep its distance,, to stay neutral and unemotional. It refuses to assign easy labels, to people or issues, even (as has been much discussed) being ambiguous about the use of torture. It gives very little back-story, even of the lead character. It doesn't work to win you to a point of view, to make you want to cheer your approval,or shake your head in shame, or even like or dislike the characters.
For most of the film I found the effect (as one might expect) oddly alienating. I was gripped by the story, but I didn't feel emotions, or care about characters in the way a 'normal' film would have made me. And while watching the film this felt like a weakness. I felt distracted, disappointed, even bored at times, regardless of the dramatic nature of the story.
Yet that same quality led me to feeling powerfully haunted by the film when it was over -- to ponder violence and its effects on human beings, the thin lines between perseverance and obsession, the inability to ever have a clear morality in time of war. It forced me to think, uncomfortably, messily about a lot of things, for myself.
2) It's a film where, to a large degree the whole movie is redeemed by its final images,
Spoiler in next sentences!
In finally articulating the lost beyond words state of our lead character, suddenly all the emotion she never allowed herself and us is paid off in seeing that facade crack.
End spoiler alert
Ultimately a very brave, and very un-Hollywood film in pace, style and content. This is war, and people in war stripped of easy answers.
There are flaws (e.g. a lot of very pretty people who look more like actors than warriors), but these are minor compared to seeing an uncompromised and deeply challenging vision.