Could Have Done With Some Trimming

Rating: 6/10 (4 April 2015)

How's this for a great idea for a film ? It's a thriller but it's not any thriller . It's a true life thriller but it's not any true life thriller . It's a true life thriller featuring the hunt for Osama Bin Laden ! Wow what a great idea and the cherry on top is that it's written by an Oscar winning screenwriter and directed by an Oscar winning director . And yet despite all this ZERO DARK THIRTY is never the compelling true life thriller it could have been
The problem lies mainly in the directing . I guess Kathryn Bigelow is trying for a fly on the wall cinema verite type of style . We as the audience are put in to the action as spectators in much the same way as the CIA characters are spectators finding it more and more difficult to influence events and becoming frustrated by it . The detached manner does make for a strangely unengaging film despite the subject matter . It's also about an hour too long and would have made a much better movie if it clocked in almost two hours rather than three . I know it's not the fault of Mark Boal but when I heard the constant references of "Bin Laden meeting Farage" I had surreal visions of the leader of Al Qaeda popping down the pub having a few drinks with the leader of The United Kingdom Independence Party
Where the film does deserve some acclaim is that it doesn't sugar-coat the fact that the CIA isn't some group of happy clappy vicars and shows the moral ambiguity of having to break the law in order to stop international crime and to bring criminals to justice along with the suggestion that if someone is poor and they know something they get waterboarded while if they're rich and know something they get a new sports car ! I also liked that the fact we had a film directed by a woman with a female lead protagonist was tracking down the leader of an organisation who want to take humanity in general and the female half especially back to a medieval dark age . But despite this ZERO DARK THIRTY is never the heart pounding true life thriller it should have been