Sunday, June 1, 2008
The Great Intentions of Rendition
In Rendition, Jake Gyllenhaal plays a CIA agent who is observing the torture of an Egyptian who lived most his life in the US taking place "somewhere in north Africa." The Egyptian has been pulled from an arrival of an international flight hooded, and put through the gauntlet of extraordinary rendtion." Jake becomes in effect the eyes of the audience. What the filmmakers want to show the world about the absurdity of rendition and the torture. Or "not torture" as the Texas accented Bush administration amalgamam CIA she-witch played by Meryl Streep claims.
The Streep character is absolutely chilling and methodical, as is the intensity of the interrogator played by Yigal Naor who reminds me of Telly Savalas in his pre-Kojak era. Yigal as the police chief/security officer really rips into the Egyptian chemist and as the story unfolds, it makes more sense. These two characters could wear black hats almost, so in contrast to the "good guys" which of course include Gyllenhaal, Reese Witherspoon as the Egyptian's widow, and a good performance by Peter Sarsgaard as a political assistant to a Senator that advocates for and delivers plot points to Witherspoon.
The film intercuts between the three connected centers of action in the way that recent noble-minded political thrillers often do these days. There is a third story surrounding Naor's family members that criss-crosses between the Witherspoon in Washington and Gyllenhaal stories. The editing room and the passion of those involved in this film kind of keep it all together. This is not a perfect film, but I kind of think that anything that's not blockbuster fodder and/or escapist entertainment is worth a viewing.
I looked on line for backstory on this film and found evidence of the Weinstein publicity machine stoking up stories about casting and intent in the fall of 06, the shooting in Spring 08, and the premiere, first at the Toronto film festival and then to the world in Fall 07. Then plop, crash and fizzle. It was another war on terror film flop in a big season (The Kingdom, Lions for Lambs, Redacted) for those. Checking out those films on DVD somehow became a personal mission for me and I have been featuring that exploration in this blog. I am still formulating my conclusions on this phenomenon and wondering how many more efforts of this sort will surface before the current boss's expiration comes up in January.
posted by well-executed buffet at 10:52 PM
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