Green Zone

Paul Greengrass, 2010 (8.4*)
This is another intense action film from terrific director Greengrass, best known for the award-winning docudrama films Bloody Sunday and United 93, and the action adventure Bourne Trilogy with Matt Damon.

The two are reunited here as we follow chief warrant officer Damon in the early days of the U.S. invasion of Iraq leading a special squad on a search of suspected WMD sites. The search keeps coming up empty, which leads Damon to question the validity of their intelligence. When he gets stonewalled, his quest leads him to a CIA field head, played by terrific Irish actor Brendan Gleeson (In Bruges).

Greengrass delicately balances action sequences with plot exposition, using an administration puppet, Greg Kinnear, and a Wall St Journal writer (Susan Lynch) who released articles about WMDs in Iraq, using an internal intel source called Magellan to protect their identity. This becomes a chase film, a nailbiter, and though light on character development, it's strong on plot and action.

Green Zone makes a good companion film to Kathryn Bigelow's best picture of 2009, The Hurt Locker, this one as we invade Baghdad, Locker following a bomb squad after we occupy the city.

Paul Greengrass [photo rt] has won 30 awards for his films so far, most for Bloody Sunday and United 93. IMDB awards page for Greengrass

Note: Roger Ebert gave this film four stars

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Bloody Sunday

Paul Greengrass, 2002 (8.8*)

The events of the day now known as Bloody Sunday in 1972 in No. Ireland are shown in documentary style as they unfolded for each of the participants. Director Greengrass (United 93) excels at this type of recreated documentary, using well-researched facts to recreate historical events as accurately as possible. His films have the look that journalists just happened to be there, up close, and were able to film events from an eyewitness perspective.

Here Greengrass shifts between the politicians planning a civil rights march in Derry, Northern Ireland, which has been prohibited by the British occupying forces, to the command of the local British army unit, to local teens planning on participating in the march. This style maintains the tension throughout even if you know the march's outcome already, even though it begins more slowly then builds momentum. The resulting tragedy is almost too much to witness again; I imagine that many in the U.K. can't find the strength to view this film.

Bloody Sunday won 19 awards worldwide, and garnered another 21 nominations. The awards page at IMDB

This intimate style of Greengrass's also worked very well in his riveting story of the events of 9/11 as they unfolded in the film United 93, in almost real time.

Greengrass (photo rt) was ranked #56 on the list of "most influential 100 in British culture" in 2008

The Wikipedia article on the events leading up to and Bloody Sunday itself

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United 93

Paul Greengrass, 2006 (9.1*)
This is a perfectly harrowing account of the one hijacked airliner on 9/11 that did not have a chance to reach it's target due to the heroic actions of some of its passengers, instead crashing into the Pennsylvania countryside. Director Paul Greengrass keeps the viewer absolutely riveted, even though we all know the results beforehand. This is done with expert editing and constant shifting from the situation being monitored on the ground by air traffic controllers, the U.S. defense system at NORAD, who were awaiting orders from an absent President Bush, and the frightening events within the aircraft itself.

The viewer can actually see a trilogy of films that presents the day's events in chronological order. The Hamburg Cell traces the origins of the hijackers, then United 93 takes us along for the ride with one group on that doomed airliner, then Oliver Stone's World Trade Center puts us inside one of the two buildings with some of the firefighters who survived the building's collapse from the inside. Of the three films, United 93 is the most riveting and the most finely crafted.

This is currently ranked #686 on our Top Ranked 1000 Films on the Internet, and #67 for films of this decade. In my opinion, it should be ranked higher and will likely climb in the polls as it reaches more viewers.

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The Bourne Trilogy

Roger Young, Paul Greengrass, 2002-07 (9.0*)
This is a nearly perfect series of spy films, with just the right mix of action and deeply complex plot development. Matt Damon has finally found his mark with these films, who knew he would be a perfect Bondish spy with deadly skills and a boyish American charm that you could trust?

The series begins with Bourne Identity, when he awakens in the Mediterranean with amnesia, and we slowly learn the facts of his existence along with Bourne; this dvd has alternate endings. Co-stars Franke Potente (Run Lola Run) as his friend. The second film, Bourne Supremacy, adds the terrific actress Joan Allen as a CIA specialist assigned to bring him in. The third film, Bourne Ultimatum, finds him again battling the agency for truth and identity and freedom. This series is actually more rewarding than the 007 films, which are usually too flippant and self-absorbed to be taken seriously (see my two exceptions reviewed here), yet Bourne also has more action than the realistic John le Carre novels (Spy Who Came in From the Cold, Smiley's People). These three must be seen in sequence, they are all a connected story.

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