fatvegan

I spontaneously watched The Kingdom with a soporific Mathew last night. It was rather brilliant. It was sufficiently like other American action movies for me to occasionally yell out loud at the crapness of Americans. But I ended up deciding that this was a choice the director made rather than obliviousness to the crapness of Americans. If you were in doubt about that, I think the final scene made it clear. The movie-goer was there to observe the Americans more than empathise with them.

I'd heard that it was politically incorrect. But I think the intensity and brashness of the film was meant to wake us up more than to titillate. Although titillate it certainly also does. I feel like that is more because it's a fascinating country with all sorts of crazy shit happening, than because Peter Berg over-dramatised it. And more than that I felt like it was fair. Obviously I know less about Saudi Arabia than plenty of people, but I know a little bit and none of it felt wrong.

I love explosions and battles, and all of those scenes were great. There is an huge, intense scene in the first bit which is so well done. The film was a long series of cuts between culturally insensitive comments from Americans and grand, beautifully choreographed battles. Even though I got excited about everything blowing up the film was pretty careful to make sure you kept worrying about all the stuff you didn't see. Some of that was totally overt, but I think that there was more subtle stuff there as well. There was zero sense of conquest or success in it. It was all just shitty. But also interesting and great.