I feel kinda bad ragging on Green Zone, as its a competent enough film, and in many ways, is an admirable achievement. But good intentions don't make for a good movie. The plot is actually well done in that its an action movie dramatization of the early weeks of the Iraq war, you've got dramatic stand ins for all the key players, there's a fake Bremer, Chalabi, the works. That the "plot" of a real and ongoing war was shoehorned into a fictionalized film is actually kinda cool.
Too bad that's really the best thing its got going for it. Everything else just like a Bourne movie, but less fun and with a queasy sheen of making something entertaining that shouldn't be. Like, its a movie full of facts for people who refuse to watch a documentary or get all their news from Fox. Or it feels like an apology to the rest of the world for being total dickbrains back in 03.
In any event, as an action movie (Greengrass pioneers new levels of shakyness in his camerawork), its not so hot, but it has its good points here and there. Jason Isaccs is never not awesome, and the rest of the cast is solid as well. Its just that, its the rare film that suffers for having too much subtext and ambition.
**1/2
