Hollywood Reporter: "Redacted" A Shocking And Deeply Moving Iraq Drama

http://www.reuters.com/article/reviewsNews/idUSN0228523020070902

"Redacted" a shocking and deeply moving Iraq drama
Sun Sep 2, 2007 7:54PM EDT
By Ray Bennett

VENICE, Italy (Hollywood Reporter) - Veteran director Brian De Palma's filmmaking skills seldom have been as razor-sharp as they are in his sensational new film, "Redacted," about members of a U.S. Army squad who rape and murder a 15-year-old Iraqi girl and slay her family.

Made on HD video and employing images from digital cameras, video recorders, Internet uploads and old-fashioned film, De Palma's movie is a ferocious argument against the engagement in Iraq for what it is doing to everyone involved. The harrowing film should find responsive audiences everywhere. It screened in competition at the Venice International Film Festival.

Made so expertly that it appears to be assembled from genuine footage, the film details the extraordinary psychological pressure suffered by young soldiers on checkpoint duty in occupied areas of Iraq. It then follows one unit as two of its members skew monstrously out of control.

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A fictional story based on real events, "Redacted" distills images from an array of sources to tell its story, beginning with those captured by Angel Salazar (Izzy Diaz), a young soldier who hopes the footage will buy his way into film school. Clean-cut Lawyer McCoy (Rob Devaney) also wields a video camera, but Salazar goes to extremes making a daily record of almost everything he sees.

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By then, footage from a French documentary about the unit has made clear how the monotony and constant fear of maintaining checkpoints grinds down the men. Constantly being told they have to remain on-duty for a further tour, they are drained and on edge. The documentary reports that during 24 months, 2,000 Iraqis were killed at checkpoints with merely 60 proved to be insurgents. In one such incident, a pregnant woman and her baby are killed when her brother taking her to the hospital races through the unit's checkpoint thinking he's been waved on.

Rush and Flake are especially vulnerable to demonizing an enemy they don't recognize or understand. Their plan to rape the daughter of a recently arrested Sunni man comes up almost idly but becomes one of deadly intent.

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DePalma's film in November. I've seen quite a few commercials for it on HDNet the last couple weeks.

Most HDNet Films releases are premiered on the HDNet Movies channel on the same day they're released to theaters, and a couple of their films have also had simultaneous DVD releases. So even if your local theaters don't pick up the film, you should be able to see it.