“The Hurt Locker” is the true hero movie of the year. Disregarding the politics of war, the cinematography gives you a point of view you could only get if you enlisted.
The film’s intimate feel is based on the first-hand observations of journalist and screenwriter Mark Boal (“Death and Dishonor”), who was embedded with a special bomb unit in Iraq.
The bomb unit, classified as the Explosive Ordnance Disposal team, is the military’s first line of fire when dealing with insurgency’s Improvised Explosive Devices.
Having caused 40 percent of coalition casualties, IEDs are the dominant threat in Iraq, and while everyone else clears the perimeter, the EOD team goes ever closer toward being another Killed in Action statistic.
Combining poetic yet documentary-style cinematography, intimate and organic scoring, and in-depth character portrayals, director Kathryn Bigelow (“Point Break”) depicts the inner psyche of individual soldiers and the dynamics of a team whose sport entails playing with bombs.
A character-driven piece, it utilizes the cameo appearances of Guy Pearce (“Memento”), Ralph Fiennes (“The Reader”) and David Morse (“John Adams”) for legitimacy, but uses breakout young actors Jeremy Renner (“The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford”), Anthony Mackie (“8 Mile”) and Brian Geraghty (“Jarhead”) to drive home its authenticity.
Sgt. William James (Renner) is the locus of the film. Careless and charismatic, he is a regular old cowboy. His carelessness worries his colleague Sgt. JT Sanborn (Mackie) and his charisma makes him a role model in the eyes of young Specialist Owen Eldridge (Geraghty). With full acceptance, he embraces his role as an EOD member.
The suit and the helmet are paradoxically thick. Purporting to separate and protect from danger, he is ever so closer to it when he has to put it on. He heaves and breathes the air in the helmet, and the closer he gets to the bomb, he should ““ in theory ““ heave and breathe heavier, but James is cool, and we feel, see and hear it.
The sound score is done by Marco Beltrami (“3:10 to Yuma”). The organic sounds of the mosques, sirens and helicopters; the breathing in the helmet, the thumping of the steps, and the bullet shells hitting the desert floor make the feel of danger intimate to the audience.
Cameras are everywhere. These “ninja” cameras make available the raw feeling of caution. Shooting from all angles, it’s as if there is always a sniper watching your every move. A combination of zooms, running camera and episodic slow motions give it a poetic feel, but capture the surroundings in a documentary fashion that makes real the feeling of being an EOD member.
Overall, this movie is nothing like its predecessors, such as “Jarhead” or “Home of the Brave.” By choosing this important yet rarely mentioned aspect of military operations, this film uses the backdrop of war to portray a special state of mind: the psyche of individual soldiers and the dynamics between them.
-Nima Moinpour
E-mail Nima at nmoinpour@media.ucla.edu.