Redacted (2007)
Country: US/CAN
Technical: col 90m
Director: Brian De Palma
Cast: Izzy Diaz, Rob Devaney, Ty Jones, Patrick Carroll
Synopsis:
A squad of US soldiers doing checkpoint duty in Iraq loses its Master Sergeant to an IED and takes vengeance on a local family they are supposed to protect.
Review:
De Palma revisits the territory of Casualties of War without stars and jumping on the back of the 'found footage' phenomenon via video footage taken by one of the grunts. He also cannot resist throwing into the mix surveillance camera footage, film from a fictional French documentary about the checkpoints, Arab news extracts, webcams, I.S. propaganda footage and even on occasion his own conventional first unit material (for example when the Master Sergeant's foot lands in front of the camera). The De Palma aesthetic is epitomized by the inclusion of dressed 'diegetic' shots amid the purported actuality photographs that conclude the film, notably that of the raped girl's burned remains: a typical directorial coup de grâce which, as often, engenders mixed feelings. In sum, Redacted fulfils all our expectations of what ill-educated, ill-disciplined and poorly led American recruits might do and say in these challenging conditions, and does so with commendable economy and some formal flair, but the cover-up suggested by the titles and elsewhere is not so much articulated as implied by the jigsaw-like reconstruction of the film itself.
Country: US/CAN
Technical: col 90m
Director: Brian De Palma
Cast: Izzy Diaz, Rob Devaney, Ty Jones, Patrick Carroll
Synopsis:
A squad of US soldiers doing checkpoint duty in Iraq loses its Master Sergeant to an IED and takes vengeance on a local family they are supposed to protect.
Review:
De Palma revisits the territory of Casualties of War without stars and jumping on the back of the 'found footage' phenomenon via video footage taken by one of the grunts. He also cannot resist throwing into the mix surveillance camera footage, film from a fictional French documentary about the checkpoints, Arab news extracts, webcams, I.S. propaganda footage and even on occasion his own conventional first unit material (for example when the Master Sergeant's foot lands in front of the camera). The De Palma aesthetic is epitomized by the inclusion of dressed 'diegetic' shots amid the purported actuality photographs that conclude the film, notably that of the raped girl's burned remains: a typical directorial coup de grâce which, as often, engenders mixed feelings. In sum, Redacted fulfils all our expectations of what ill-educated, ill-disciplined and poorly led American recruits might do and say in these challenging conditions, and does so with commendable economy and some formal flair, but the cover-up suggested by the titles and elsewhere is not so much articulated as implied by the jigsaw-like reconstruction of the film itself.
Country: US/CAN
Technical: col 90m
Director: Brian De Palma
Cast: Izzy Diaz, Rob Devaney, Ty Jones, Patrick Carroll
Synopsis:
A squad of US soldiers doing checkpoint duty in Iraq loses its Master Sergeant to an IED and takes vengeance on a local family they are supposed to protect.
Review:
De Palma revisits the territory of Casualties of War without stars and jumping on the back of the 'found footage' phenomenon via video footage taken by one of the grunts. He also cannot resist throwing into the mix surveillance camera footage, film from a fictional French documentary about the checkpoints, Arab news extracts, webcams, I.S. propaganda footage and even on occasion his own conventional first unit material (for example when the Master Sergeant's foot lands in front of the camera). The De Palma aesthetic is epitomized by the inclusion of dressed 'diegetic' shots amid the purported actuality photographs that conclude the film, notably that of the raped girl's burned remains: a typical directorial coup de grâce which, as often, engenders mixed feelings. In sum, Redacted fulfils all our expectations of what ill-educated, ill-disciplined and poorly led American recruits might do and say in these challenging conditions, and does so with commendable economy and some formal flair, but the cover-up suggested by the titles and elsewhere is not so much articulated as implied by the jigsaw-like reconstruction of the film itself.