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The Kingdom
The Kingdom doesn't exactly reign supreme, but it will collect its fair share of loyal subjects. Now go and buy me another island.
With all this criticism slowly crystallising in my head, I was all ready to give it a faintly damning 2/5, but then the very final scene wandered onstage and turned the whole message on its head - rather heavy-handedly, but nonetheless very effectively. Without giving it away, it's as if they're saying, "yeah, we know it's bordering on propaganda. Don't blame us, we didn't write it." This scene - in fact the very last line - added more to the movie than any amount of exploding trucks could've done. The Kingdom isn't all it could have been. There's enough action and bravado to satisfy the jocks and squaddies, but its blatant flag-waving precludes it from any kind of serious-movie credibility. It's a very big gun, but it's firing blanks. I enjoyed this film: I think the average moviegoer will enjoy it: - yes, I know this seems to contradict what I've said, nevertheless I think most viewers won't mind the flaws. Testosterone Satisfaction Rating: - bang, crash, shooty, kablooie. To enjoy this film you should be: tolerant of the clumsy politics.
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Do you remember 
Peter Berg takes the director's chair - you may remember him as the star of the best movie never to get a cinema release:
The Last Seduction - and he takes a cameo here just so we don't forget what he looks like. He does a pretty good job on
the whole, but the hand-held wobbling of the camera is way overdone. A little jiggle is fine and adds atmosphere - but we
sway around as if we're watching through the eyes of Pete Doherty on a waltzer. As soon as you notice it, it stays with
you for the whole movie and proves a major distraction. Mind you, that's probably a good thing, as you don't want to be
thinking too much - you're better off having a quick kip until the next action scene turns up. If you start paying
attention you'll be very confused (as I was) about the mysterious bad guy they keep talking about called Abu Hamza ... who
may or may not be the real-life UK Muslim cleric with the arm-hook who pops up on the news every now and then. I still
don't know if they were talking about that guy - there seem to be a few people with that name so I guess it's a confusing
coincidence. It doesn't help.
I'm being rather negative about The Kingdom, and with good reason, but it does have something huge in its favour. It's
not the support of eternal war-man Chris Cooper, Jennifer Garner, or Arrested Development's Jason Bateman, good though
they all are. It's not the action, though the ending is suitably compelling. It's the music. Throughout the movie
at virtually every point there's some sort of background music going on, and it's this audio that makes the movie. If you
ask the average person leaving the cinema to describe the music, they'll say, "what music?" and that's what makes it great.
It creates suspense, it builds tension, and it IS the entire atmosphere of the movie. It came as no surprise to check
the credits and find Danny Elfman's name there - along with John Williams he has to be one of the greatest movie musicians
of all time, credited with most of Tim Burton's back catalogue and countless other movies - he even wrote The Simpsons
theme tune.
So the music saves it then. Well, not really. Brilliant though the soundtrack is, it can't make a good movie on its own.
However fabulous your shoes are, you're still going to look a dick if you're wearing a bullet-proof vest in Sainsbury's.
The movie seems to be nothing more than an attempt to raise national pride in the US, and it doesn't even try to hide it.
It seems to think it's
