The Hurt Locker (2009)

Directed by Kathryn Bigelow
Written by Mark Boal
Featuring Jeremy Renner, Anthony Mackie, Brian Geraghty, Guy Pierce, Ralph Fiennes, David Morse, Evangeline Lilly, Christian Camargo, Christopher Sayegh, and David Morse
Release Date: June 26th, 2009

Kathryn Bigelow wows the film universe by yet again doing the unthinkable: directing an action movie with as much entertainment value as any man. She’s defied these laws of sexual physics before, with inexplicable gender-of-director-ambiguity in sci-fi Strange Days, thrillers Point Break and Blue Steel, and the Eric Red action vampire horror western Near Dark. Film fans, horror fans, and action movie buffs alike all love Bigelow. She, like Gale Ann Hurd, graduated from the James Cameron School of Filmmaking, and her latest film The Hurt Locker is an action war movie of which Michael Bay should be jealous. Explosions? Check. Automatic gun stuff? Check. Guys doing guy things? Check. All that’s missing is the cheesy one-liners, lack of believable character development, and a few slutty women and it might even be mistaken for a movie directed by a man.

'The Hurt Locker', like 'Davey Jones’s Locker' to Navy dudes, is the Army dudes’ way of saying ‘A bad place you don’t wanna go’. And the whole film, everyone’s trying not to fall into 'The Hurt Locker'. Jeremy Renner is Staff Sergeant William James, newly in charge of Sergeant JT Sanborn (Anthony Mackie) and Specialist Owen Eldridge (Brian Geraghty). Sanborn and Eldridge were led by Sergeant Matt Thompson (Guy Pierce), but he got blown to pieces by a massive explosion a few days before. You see, Sanborn and Eldridge are a highly trained bomb disposal team in Iraq in 2003 who concentrate on dismantling homemade bombs amid the urban chaos of occupied territory. Sergeant James’s sarcasm, unpredictability, and general ‘maverick-ness’ make him a wild card that Sanborn doesn’t fully appreciate. James repeatedly puts Sanborn and Eldridge into unnecessary danger by seeking out hazardous situations and risking his own life. The younger Eldridge goes along, while Sanborn tends to argue. But in the end, there’s no option but to obey an order no matter how dangerous that comes from a superior officer.

The awesome landscape and just one of many explosions

The beautifully shot movie is a landscape of hostility both urban and bleak desert. Filmed in Syria, The Hurt Locker gives a new meaning to the word 'Iraq'; a vivid view of the endless sand and parched cityscape in which all of the action takes place. The restless Iraqi citizens are as hostile as the environment; there’s no respite for the soldiers. Despite James, Sanborn, and Eldridge having a definite purpose every time they leave the base(to dismantle bombs as they are discovered by roaming troops) the relentlessness of the unfriendly locals in building new bombs is disheartening. The audience, and perhaps the characters themselves, feel that their task is sometimes pointless. Based on writer Mark Baol’s own experiences as a bomb specialist in Iraq, the story has intimate details about daily life for soldiers in Iraq, especially in the earlier part of the war, that delicately accentuate the subtle anxiety that slowly builds with each dangerous situation. Sergeant James becomes aware of just how bad the bomb situation really is in Baghdad when human beings are being used as suicide bombers and children become victims of experimental bomb surgeries in filthy manufacturing facilities. Something in James’s nature drives him to pursue the people he feels are personally responsible for the atrocities, dragging Sanborn and Eldridge into the mess with him.

Jeremy Renner is a complicated and conflicted soldier

There are no politics discussed in The Hurt Locker – there’s just three guys doing a job they are proud of in a place they hate, counting the days until they can go home. That is, if they survive that long.

There’s some concentrated character building that allows Renner, Mackie, and Geraghty to make real human beings out of their action heroes; including some fun bonding scenes involving traditional male drunken jackassedness and grappling, handled superbly by Bigelow. Bigelow also does a nice job of using Guy Pierce and Ralph Fiennes in what are essential bit parts. They’re extremely intense actors and their small appearances add a non-characteristic surprise element to the action movie.

Urban Chaos mixed with some artful cinematography

Because it is ultimately an action movie first and foremost. Most of the film centers on the action these men see. Less shaky and schizophrenic than other urban war movies, like Black Hawk Down, The Hurt Locker really concentrates on showing the complete picture of urban chaos, mass explosions and gunfire, and organized military in as clear a way as possible. It also manages to let the characters lead, instead of putting them in cliché arena of fast-talking, smooth-fighting supermen with big guns. These are real people, and their bravery causes us anxiety every time they face possible death.

Trailer:

The Hurt Locker is out June 26th, 2009 in select theaters.

Rating: (4 out of 5):