the green zone

matt damon continues to prove he deserved his "sexiest man alive" title in "the green zone". he convincingly plays an army chief warrant officer charged with hunting and finding wmd in 2007 iraq. "the green zone" is an action thriller war film written by brian helgeland and directed by paul greengrass. the film is "credited as having been 'inspired' by" the non-fiction 2006 book "imperial life in the emerald city" by journalist rajiv chandrasekaran, which documented life in the green zone, baghdad. the green zone being the common name for the international zone of iraq— a 10-square-kilometer (3.8-square-mile) area in central baghdad, iraq, that was the center of the coalition provisional authority and remains the center of the international presence in the city.

this is a story about fictional people portraying a real occurrence in which real people searched for fictional weapons. matt does a great job as the disillusioned leader of wmd hunting squad, who cares more about the truth than his orders. he bucks the system, snakily played by greg kinnear, and teams up with cia operator brendon gleason (yes the cia is the good guy in this story) to find out who made deals with whom in order to get the u.s. into iraq. right wingers will say this movie is yet another example of liberal hollywood spinning it's conspiracy agenda. people who think for themselves will call it a history lesson.

kinnear and damon play off each other very well. at one point after watching damon throw kinnear around, i thought, next movie kinnear needs to add a line in his contract that'll allow him to throw damon around. but then my friend reminded me that the last time we saw these two on the screen together, they were literally glued to one another in "stuck on you" in which they played siamese twins! no wonder they have this great rhythm!

all though i am a peacenik, i love to see all the big toys our military has to play with. i love the big guns, helicopters, rockets, tanks- the works! and yes i am very glad if anyone has to have them that it is us!! i just wish they never used them...

also, my friend and i loved the scarf damon wore- very yasser arafat printed. i always felt guilty admiring arafat's scarf because he was the bad guy. but now that damon in the personage of this american maverick (a real maverick mr. mccain) wears one, that it is ok for me to openly like it! and maybe even buy one.

anyway, back to the movie: tight, suspenseful, and entertaining. if you miss it in the theaters, rent it.