After an opening weekend where it produced rather surprising gross receipts considering it had only premiered in 299 theaters, the theatrical release of the film adaption of Ayn Rand’s Atlas Shrugged has proven to be a disappointment. This past weekend, it expanded to and additional 166 theaters, yet saw its weekend receipts decline by nearly 50%, causing the film’s producer to admit that the entire project is now in jeopardy:

EXCLUSIVE: Twelve days after opening “Atlas Shrugged: Part 1,” the producer of the Ayn Rand adaptation said Tuesday that he is reconsidering his plans to make Parts 2 and 3 because of scathing reviews and flagging box office returns for the film.

“Critics, you won,” said John Aglialoro, the businessman who spent 18 years and more than $20 million of his own money to make, distribute and market “Atlas Shrugged: Part 1,” which covers the first third of Rand’s dystopian novel. “I’m having deep second thoughts on why I should do Part 2.”

“Atlas Shrugged” was the top-grossing limited release in its opening weekend, generating $1.7 million on 299 screens and earning a respectable $5,640 per screen. But the the box office dropped off 47% in the film’s second week in release even as “Atlas Shrugged” expanded to 425 screens, and the movie seemed to hold little appeal for audiences beyond the core group of Rand fans to whom it was marketed.

Aglialoro attributed the box office drop-off to “Atlas Shrugged’s” poor reviews. Only one major critic — Kyle Smith of the New York Post — gave “Atlas” a mixed-to-positive review, calling the film “more compelling than the average mass-produced studio item.” The movie has a dismal 7% fresh rating on review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes thanks to critics like the Chicago Tribune’s Michael Phillips, who said “Atlas” is “crushingly ordinary in every way.” Roger Ebert called the film “the most anticlimactic non-event since Geraldo Rivera broke into Al Capone’s vault,” while Rolling Stone’s Peter Travers said the movie “sits there flapping on screen like a bludgeoned seal.”

“The New York Times gave us the most hateful review of all,” said Aglialoro, who also has a writing credit on the movie. “They didn’t cover it.”

(…)

Though the film has made only $3.1 million so far, Aglialoro said he believes he’ll recoup his investment after TV, DVD and other ancillary rights are sold. But he is backing off an earlier strategy to expand “Atlas” to 1,000 screens and reconsidering his plans to start production on a second film this fall.

“Why should I put up all of that money if the critics are coming in like lemmings?” Aglialoro said. “I’ll make my money back and I’ll make a profit, but do I wanna go and do two? Maybe I just wanna see my grandkids and go on strike.”

It’s true that there were many negative reviews from people who you’d expect to be turned off by the film’s message, such as Roger Ebert, but you can’t just chalk the bad reviews to ideological bias when you hear the same negative things from people who are sympathetic to Rand’s ideas like Megan McArdle and P.J. O’Rourke. On top of this, there were problems with this production from the beginning, and it was never quite clear that there would be mass appeal for a movie based on a novel that reads more like a philosophical treatise than a compelling work of fiction.

I haven’t seen the movie yet, mostly because the closest theater where it’s playing is almost an hour away from me. I’d like to see it, but at this point I guess I’ll just wait until it’s out on DVD.

A final thought. Aglialoro, like most producers with a failed production, blames the critics. However, isn’t this really just an example of the free market in action? Seems like it to me.

When I heard they were making a movie out of Ayn Rand’s magnum opus, I mostly cringed. While I don’t consider myself a Rand devotee, I had read the book in college and it was, in many respects, responsible for both my later drift into libertarianism and my rejections of an observant Catholic upbringing as an adult. There had been talk even then of bringing the book to the screen in some form. Indeed, these conversations had already been going on for decades when I read the book  in the 1990s. Back in the 1970′s, Rand herself was approached by Al Ruddy, who has just achieved worldwide acclaim as the Producer of The Godfather and The Godfather Part II. Ruddy wanted to back a big screen version of Atlas Shrugged, but Rand rebuffed him for reasons that one could only describe as slightly paranoid. In the years that followed, there were several stops and starts on film treatments, including one rumor a few years ago that Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt wanted to star in the movie, but we ended up with the version that hit screens today came about because the Producer decided to go into production to preserve his options rights. One blogger sympathetic to Rand’s ideas predicted it would a “low-budget, haphazard rush.”

Megan McArdle, who clearly isn’t as antithetical to the message of the book as Roger Ebert, seems to confirm this prediction:

It isn’t that Atlas Shrugged couldn’t possibly make a good movie.  To be sure, it is the size and weight of a pretty solid doorstop, filled with approximately 1 squillion characters, and almost as many sub-plots.  But the same could be said of Lord of the Rings, which made a terrific trilogy

That’s the approach that the director took with Atlas Shrugged–the screener I was sent was merely for Part I.  I wish I could report that the movie holds out the same kind of promise that the first Lord of the Rings movie did.  Unfortunately, it’s . . . how do I say this . . . an incoherent mess that put me less in mind of Peter Jackson than Tommy Wisseau.  It was a huge mistake to watch it on a laptop; I spent the entire time fighting a nearly overpowering urge to check my email.

I know that some Rand fans who like the movie are going to accuse me of sucking up to my liberal cocktail-party attending friends by unfairly slamming a damn fine film. The sad truth is that I don’t attend that many cocktail parties–certainly not as many as the people in this film.  Ayn Rand’s characters are already so understated as to be nearly wooden–her sensibility was heavily influenced by the “strong but silent” aesthetic of the penny adventure serials of her youth.  And in the hands of these actors, they’re practically petrified.  In lieu of emotions, the entire cast seems to have turned to drink.  Half the action takes place over a glass of wine or a tumbler of whiskey.  I suppose this is what you have to expect from a roomful of rigid, controlling people who have difficulty speaking about any emotions that don’t involve metallurgical studies.

Of course, “action” is a strong word.  Most of these scenes consist of people drinking in hotel lobbies, drinking at restaurants, drinking at cocktail parties, and drinking in their bedrooms.  In between, they do a little bit of striding purposefully.  Also, sometimes they sit behind improbably neat desks.  When drama is required, they stand up.

P.J. O’Rourke, who one would also think of as being sympathetic to Rand’s ideas, is just as dismissive:

The movie version of Ayn Rand’s novel treats its source material with such formal, reverent ceremoniousness that the uninitiated will feel they’ve wandered without a guide into the midst of the elaborate and interminable rituals of some obscure exotic tribe.

Meanwhile, members of that tribe of “Atlas Shrugged” fans will be wondering why director Paul Johansson doesn’t knock it off with the incantations, sacraments and recitations of liturgy and cut to the human sacrifice.

Upright railroad-heiress heroine Dagny Taggart and upright steel-magnate hero Hank Rearden are played with a great deal of uprightness (and one brief interlude of horizontality) by Taylor Schilling and Grant Bowler.  They indicate that everything they say is important by not using contractions. John Galt, the shadowy genius who’s convincing the people who carry the world on their shoulders to go out on strike, is played, as far as I can tell, by a raincoat.

The rest of the movie’s acting is borrowed from “Dallas,” although the absence of Larry Hagman’s skill at subtly underplaying villainous roles is to be regretted. Staging and action owe a debt to “Dynasty”—except, on “Dynasty,” there usually was action.

The producer’s apparent business plan here is to use most of the profits from this film to finance the production of the second part of the trilogy, and to do the same with the second film to finance the third. Given the reviews the movie is getting, the relatively limited opening, and the unfortunate fact that it sounds like they’ve written the screenplay in such a way as to make the film largely incomprehensible to anyone who isn’t familiar with the book, one wonders if there will be a Part 2 or Part 3. I’ll go see this movie, eventually (which won’t be easy since the closest theater showing it is a one-hour drive away), and I may share my thoughts here, but I can’t help shake the feeling that this is a movie that never should’ve been made.

Knowing that TRON: Legacy was coming out soon (and that I’d be watching it in IMAX 3D on opening night), I rewatched my 20th Anniversary DVD of the original TRON for the first time in a few years again recently. I was pleased by how well the film stood up despite the 28 years (and astonishing improvements in CGI) since its release. And I’m glad I did. I’d no doubt have missed a few Easter Eggs in the sequel were the old movie not fresh in my mind.

This movie is an almost perfect sequel. There are callbacks (and assorted pop culture references) to the original aplenty, without them ever seeming forced or contrived (Sam’s, “Now that’s a big door” was an especial favourite). The plot isn’t especially deep or complex, but it follows smoothly and anturally from, and to some extent mirrors, the original without ever seeming like a remake. And almost every detail of the Grid has been designed with amazing attention to detail to create an updated appearance for the first one. Every vehicle, setting, and costume design is a clear, unapologetic successor to its progenitor. The overall effect is a stunning level of verisimilitude.

Perhaps what struck me most about the film, though, was the bold choice in its pacing and tone. It would have been easy to make a TRON sequel that was little more than a frenetic action flick with lots of eye candy. But Director Joseph Kosinski chose instead to create a majestic, philosophical film. Daft Punk’s much-praised score is an essential element in making that a reality, as is most striking during the dogfight leading up to the climax. Take this exact same movie and put some Rammstein under it and the mood and feel would have been completely different.

The one truly false note of the movie was Michael Sheen’s Zuse, who almost seemed to be an intentional spoof of The Merovingian from The Matrix: Reloaded (there were a few moments I felt were subtle snubs to those sequels, truth be told). The effect was unnecessarily jarring without contributing much to the third act reversal. Also, brilliant though the “de-aging” of Jeff bridges is, that’s one effect that will not hold up well as time passes. For Clu, it’s not much of an issue. He’s a computer construct so even though he doesn’t quite match the other constructs around him (a problem solved largely by covering the faces of most of his minions in dark face shields, a two-fer that also assists a significant plot device), the unreality of it more or less works. But in the handful of flashback scenes where the CGI avatar is used for live action, it doesn’t.

Go see this movie. If at all possible, see it in IMAX 3D as God intended. Your enjoyment will be enhanced if you watch the original again first, but familiarity with the first film is not required to enjoy this one. I won’t go as far as the (obviously quite invested) Tron Guy but I can say that I loved it. And, what’s more, I expect that I’ll enjoy it more every time I watch it.

About halfway through Inception, it struck me: This movie was succeeding at doing what The Matrix tried to do but never quite pulled off. Exploring the external manipulation of the inner workings of the mind is a delicate subject. And one which, apparently, requires a lot of exposition.

Fortunately, I don’t mind exposition. A lot of commentators have praised the film for the boldness of its complexity, fearing it will lose audiences. I didn’t find it too complicated; in fact, a little less explanation would have been fine. Or, at least, rearranging the explanations so that, when the “kick” from a twist hits, the action isn’t interrupted by another explanatory scene. A lot of this comes from an obvious decision to create mystery, but it bogs down the climax.

With so much plot to explain, the characters never get the chance to develop any real chemistry. Ariadne’s (Ellen Page) quick grasp of what’s really driving Cobb (Leonardo DiCaprio) and her (frequent and emphatic) pleas for him to grapple with his demons have to do double duty as plot drivers and substitute emotional connection. With so many characters, only Cobb really gets to develop, leading one to think the concept might have been a better subject for a three or four episode miniseries.

Don’t get me wrong; the movie is outstanding. Its structure is a deftly layered as the dreamworld designed by Ariadne. For all the emphasis the marketing campaign put on the “mindcrime” concept, I cannot recall the word actually being used in the film (I may have missed a mention, of course, but it certainly didn’t have the centrality one expected). But that head-fake actually works on a meta-level, as it creates an expectation that this will be an entirely different film than it is. And, once you’re inside, you quickly realize that what you might’ve thought you were getting paled in comparison to the actual product.

The film’s most impressive feat is inducing the audience to buy into the “mindcrime” being perpetrated. Heist movies (and this is one, at the core) generally work to get the audience to cheer on the heisters. But this “heist,” which looks more like mental rape than mere theft of property, is an altogether more challenging crime to applaud. I won’t spoil the ending, but suffice it to say that Cobb’s (ultimately selfish) reasons for taking the job aren’t enough to make the manipulation of Robert Fischer, Jr. (Cillian Murphy) justifiable. And yet one would have to be a coldly detached philosophical purist to think that he himself would have it any other way once it’s done.

I don’t think I can say anything about Cobb’s demons, the true emotional core of the film, without spoilers, so I will leave them to the reader to discover. Which I heartily encourage you to do. Inception has imposed itself as the film to beat for Best Picture and, I would guess, will become the lodestone for “mind movies” for a generation. Don’t miss it.

8) The Godfather II: 6 (1974)
8) Jaws: 6 (1975)
8) Raiders of the Lost Ark: 6 (1981)
8) Pulp Fiction: 6 (1994)
8) Braveheart: 6 (1995)
6) The Shawshank Redemption: 7 (1994)
6) The Princess Bride: 7 (1987)
5) The Incredibles: 8 (2004)
4) The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring: 9 (2001)
3) Star Wars: 11 (1977)
2) Casablanca: 13 (1942)
1) The Godfather: 14 (1972)

Only two of my own non-ordered top 10 submissions made the list:

Pulp Fiction
Big Jake
O Brother Where Art Thou
Top Gun
Shawshank Redemption
Die Hard
Cool Hand Luke
Monty Python’s Life of Brian
Rio Bravo

Oddly, both “Pulp Fiction” and “Shawshank Redemption” were released in 1994.   I’m not sure whether that’s purely coincidental or whether that represents some sweet spot in the age overlap of the polled bloggers.

It occurs to me that I left “Star Trek II: Wrath of Khan” off my list.  But it’s not really a fair inclusion, in that it’s only great because of how it fits into the very long arc of the series, including the television series that preceded it.

Otherwise, Tarantino’s “Pulp Fiction” and “Reservoir Dogs” are easily my favorite films of the gangster genre.  While the Godfather flicks had some great lines, I actually find them rather tedious.  And I never got the allure of “Goodfellas,” which seems to always make the “great guy movies” lists.

I don’t think “Jaws” has held up all that well.  I still like “Star Wars,” although not as much as I once did; and it’s not even the best film in its own trilogy.  “The Incredibles” was fine but wouldn’t make my top 100.   “Princess Bride” is quite good — maybe even in my top 25 — but it’s merely clever on the tenth viewing, while “O Brother” remains hilarious and “Life of Brian” remains fresh and brilliant satire despite the passage of decades.

Feel free to submit your own favorites in the comments.

I don’t know how else to tell you all who love this blog. I am Jon Swift’s Mom and I guess I’m going to OUT him. He was Al Weisel, my beloved son. Al was on his way to his father’s funeral in VA when he suffered 2 aortic aneurysms, a leaky aortic valve and an aortic artery dissection from his heart to his pelvis. He had 3 major surgeries within 24 hours and sometime during those surgeries also suffered a severe stroke. We, his 2 sisters, his brother, his partner and his best friend since he was 9 years old were with him as he took his last breath. We have all lost a shining start who warmed our hearts, tormented us and made us laugh as he giggled at our pulling something over on us. He passed away on February 27, 2010. My beloved child will live on in so many hearts. I miss him more than I can say. If you are on Facebook, go to organizations and join “Friends of Al Weisel, Unite!” It will give you just a taste of how special he was. Farewell, Jon (Al)

Truly sad news.  Aside from the horror of losing your son so unexpectedly, doing it while getting ready to bury your husband is too cruel for words.   It’s good to see that she’s at least moving forward.

Compounding the pathos further, the news was posted on the last-ever post at Jon Swift blog, almost exactly a year old, titled “Sometimes There Are No Words” and linking to Chuck Butcher‘s post announcing that his son, Nicholas Andrew Butcher, had taken his own life.  I recall the post, which was widely circulated at the time, but hadn’t realized it would be the coda to the site.

As with all blogs these days, I visited only when something interesting popped up in my feed reader or following a link from elsewhere, so was only vaguely aware that the site had lapsed.

So far as I know, Swift’s real-life identity was successfully kept secret from all but his closet friends.  As Al Weisel, he co-authored “Live Fast, Die Young: The Wild Ride of Making Rebel Without a Cause.”  A collection of his non-blog writing can be found here.

A tremendous number of eulogies and remembrances are being posted around the blogosphere — left, right, and center — and more will file in as the news spreads.  A few of the most noteworthy are linked and summarized below.

Vanity Fair‘s James Wolcott observes, “Years before The Colbert Report came on the scene with eyebrows raised, Weisel/Swift used indignant rightwing rhetoric and tropes to spoof righteous rightwing jingoism.”

Tom Watson (no, not that Tom Watson) knew Al personally and reflects, “Al Weisel was the political poser’s worst enemy as Jon Swift, but he was also a good guy to hang around the pub with and commiserate over New York’s shrinking freelance rates. Gone all too soon, he’ll be truly missed by many.”

Skakesville‘s Melissa McEwan was likewise a colleague at another blog and observes, “He drifted in and out of blogging, when real life accommodated or got in the way. I was a genuine fan of his writing, and he was an absolutely delightful guy in every conversation I had with him.”

Jason Chervokas, a lifelong friend, has a long reflection on Al’s complicated existence.  Particularly interesting, for those of us who knew him only as a pseudonymous blogging satirist, is that “keeping secrets was definitely one of Al’s most treasured inner pastimes. . . . I know Al was proud of Jon Swift, perhaps a little frustrated by his inability to make it pay off in a kind of Matt Drudgey way. He certainly was gleeful about poking fun at conservative group think (sometimes the line between his parodies and the non-parodic statements of actual conservatives was indecipherable), and his malicious, gleeful, nervous laugh will be sorely missed. But I keep wondering, reading the Swift mourning, how many personae Al really had and who among his family, friends and lovers actually knew all of Al?”

That’s probably true of most of us.  But probably even moreso in this case.

On about six different levels The Book of Eli is the finest film ever made, though I’ll require a couple of additional viewings to come up with a comparative analysis between it and Mel Gibson’s The Passion of the Christ. While it would not be appropriate to discuss the film in depth, simply because there’s a “surprise” factor (or two, or three) involved with this film, I can say the plot, the acting, the cinematography, and particularly the music are unmatched in cinema history.

Wowsers.  That’s pretty enticing.  Were I his target audience, however, he should have stopped there.  I wasn’t and he didn’t.

If I were to reduce the film to a simple sentence I would quote St. Francis when he said, “Preach the Gospel at all times, if necessary use words.”  This film is a brilliantly executed symbol that expresses the tension of the experience of Infinite Being in metalepsis with being at the eschaton. Brilliantly written and beautifully executed the film reflects the effects of Original Sin on the nature of man, where man is moving to that point where he no longer remembers the Logos or seeks the redemption and salvation of Jesus Christ.

I’ll probably see it, anyway, although methinks I’ll wait for the DVD.   (Of course, I pretty much wait for the DVD for anything other than big special effects movies.  I prefer dramas and comedies in the comfort of my own living room.)

I recall it well, having just recently returned to the States from Germany and waiting to start 8th grade in El Paso.  I’ve seen most of his movies since and become a bigger fan.

Someone (Robert Prather, perhaps) shared via Google Reader a superb tribute by Roger Ebert published earlier this week in the Chicago Tribune.  I recommend it highly.

Alex lists his five favorite Duke movies, and they’re all good.  “Rio Bravo” and “Horse Soldiers” are two of my favorites as well.  I like Wayne in his later years, where his humor was more integral to his roles.  My all-time favorites are “Big Jake,” “The Commancheros,” “El Dorado,” “Chisum,” and “Rooster Cogburn.” The last, a reprise of his Oscar-winning role in “True Grit,” was a more enjoyable movie.

Of his non-Westerns, “The Quiet Man” is easily my favorite.  The WWII flicks “In Harm’s Way” and “They Were Expendable” were also quite superb.

The trailer from “Big Jake” is below.

What are your favorites?

Big Hollywood’s Leo Grin has an excellent analysis of the classic Howard Hawks film Rio Bravo,  which was made 50 years ago. A generous excerpt:

Characters are the most important elements of any Hawks movie. By 1958 he had concluded that “audiences were getting tired of plots….But if you keep them from knowing what the plot is you have a chance of holding their interest…It’s when a character believes in something that a situation happens, not because you write it to happen.” Hawks had an unparalleled flair for consciously using detail to expertly reveal character. All throughout the production of Rio Bravo, he would sit silently as the actors rehearsed their scenes, ever on the lookout for ways to organically grow their motivations cinematically, thereby creating deep wells of subtext without clubbing the audience over the head with a screaming, obvious M-E-S-S-A-G-E.

[...]

Most crucially, it was director Hawks who crafted John Wayne’s character into a master not only of action but of reaction, in the process establishing an overriding feeling of camaraderie that makes the film endlessly rewatchable. “John Wayne represents more force, more power than anyone else on screen,” Hawks claimed, and yet by dint of directorial will the star of Rio Bravo becomes everyone else’s straight man. During the course of the plot the Duke gets socked by Dean Martin (twice!), is verbally out-dueled by the precocious Ricky Nelson, suffers the outrageous behavior of Walter Brennan, is relentlessly teased by the ever-flirtatious Angie Dickinson, and is continuously rescued by all of the above. “You give everybody else the fireworks,” Wayne grumbled to Hawks at one point, “but I have to carry the damn thing.”

And yet Hawks knew that, with a universe of talents at his disposal, Wayne’s secret weapon was always his generosity and humility as an actor, his penchant for binding himself and his ego to the needs of a picture. He was unparalleled in his ability to lend his potent movie-star glow to others in a scene, holding up the entire business like a grizzled, enduring Atlas. For Rio Bravo, the breakthrough came during one of Dean Martin’s many set-pieces, while Wayne was standing aside and watching glumly as Martin got to once again chew up the scenery with his performance. “What do I do while he’s playing all of these good scenes?” he finally asked Hawks in frustration.

“Well,” Hawks replied, “you look at him as a friend.”

Suddenly everything Hawks had been striving for, the entire emotional spectrum he was meticulously constructing, became clear. And throughout the finished Rio Bravo, you can go to any point and see the spectacular results of Wayne embracing Hawks’ perceptive direction. Watch, for instance, the scene after Walter Brennan’s character Stumpy has almost killed Dean Martin by carelessly shooting at him through the jailhouse door. Wayne stands by as Brennan, one of the all-time great scene-stealing character actors, goes through an entire blabbering monologue of words and emotions that covers denial, mortification, and finally a resigned acceptance of responsibility. It’s all great stuff, hugely entertaining — but look closely at Wayne. Not a word spoken, not a single word. And yet his pitch-perfect reactions to each of Brennan’s lines gives the scene its touching pathos and power.

Wayne spends virtually the entire film loaning his star power to others in this fashion, not acting so much as reacting, and using those reactions to give his co-stars a much brighter spotlight in which to shine. Indisputably, we have Howard Hawks to thank for that.

Much, much more at the link.

Randy Barnett says the flick “was never one of my favorite westerns” but will give it another go after Grin’s review. It’s long been one of my favorite Wayne flicks precisely because of the great character interaction described above, featuring the superb repartee that was a hallmark of most of the Duke’s best movies.  Similarly, the best of the genre, and certainly “Rio Bravo” was an archetype, very much had a M-E-S-S-A-G-E but it was conveyed through the protagonist’s deeds rather than a lot of speechifying.

John Wayne vehicles were seldom realistic and often corny by today’s more cynical standards.  But they were incredibly entertaining and uplifting.  I recently saw the new “Star Trek” movie and found it much the same.  After years of that franchise leaving its “space opera” roots for more preachy plots, it was great to see the focus returned to daring heroism and the interaction between friends whose bonds have been forged through shared trials.

See my July 2003 post, “High Noon for U.S. Army,” for a more detailed discussion of Rio Bravo as Hawks’ and Wayne’s angry counterpoint to the Gary Cooper classic High Noon. Grin’s essay also discusses that angle.

Watching the trailers for ‘The Kingdom’ over the past several months, I was curious about how the film would portray Saudi Arabia and Saudis. I had personal experience with terrorist bombings of residential compounds in Riyadh and wanted to see how accurate the film might be.

The film could have taken the low and easy road, pandering to stereotypes, and shown the Saudis as slavering jihadists looking forward to killing the infidel. It could have taken (and did to a very minor extent did) the path of ‘Syriana’ [see my review here and Amir Taheri's here], claiming on the basis of old and mistaken stereotypes that the oil companies write the rules.

Instead, I was pleased to see that the film showed that while there are bad Saudis, there are also good and decent Saudis who care about their country, their religion, and justice.

The film carries a very strong sense of authenticity. The researchers did their homework when it came to finding the right imagery to convey the sense of time and place. Much of it was shot in Abu Dhabi, with some B-roll materials from Riyadh spliced in. The rest was filmed in ‘non-denominational’ deserts in the American Southwest and in DC. The film was mostly realistic, too, when it came to the bombings, but not quite the same as the compounds bombed in 2003. The film spares us the body parts. That was fine by me, as I found myself slipping back to the reality of May 2003.

The film was accurate in its portrayal of a sharp-elbowed FBI investigation team running headlong into the reluctant Saudi police, a reaction not unknown to American local police departments and itself the subject matter of other films.

The film gets off to an iffy start, I think. The collage over which the opening credits run provides a brief and mostly accurate history of Saudi Arabia and its relations with the US. I think it focuses inaccurately on oil. While oil is certainly an important aspect of the US-Saudi relation, it is neither the sole one nor necessarily the most important one. Here, though the film feeds the meme that it’s ‘all about oil’, viewers needn’t worry about it. After the credits, the word never comes up again.

In order to avoid spoilers, the rest of the review is below the fold. I haven’t compromised major plot development, but some of the early set-up is discussed. You can also find a lengthier review at Crossroad Arabia, focusing more on the film v. reality clash.

‘The Kingdom’ works from a dated template. The ‘rules’ about how the US government and its agencies respond to an overseas bombing had chanced by 2003. What the film shows is based on rules that applied in 1996 and 1998. In reality, as soon as they could fly in—the next day—a team of about 35 FBI investigators were in Riyadh. These were a specialized group, designed to investigate bombings. They were professional. They did not (at least publicly) carry weapons. The women on the team—and there were several—knew better than to wear form-fitting T-shirts as their outerwear. They were also prepared to work cooperatively with their Saudi counterparts, whether from the police, Saudi Arabian National Guard (one of the 2003 compounds housed American and others on contract to the National Guard), and the Ministry of Interior. The Saudis, post-9/11, were also prepared to cooperate.

Probably the least accurate part of the film was its portrayal of the US State Department and its officers. Nothing new here: they’re tediously shown as ‘cookie-pushers’ who have yet to evolve backbones. That’s the standard stereotype, particularly from the political right, but it’s far from the reality. I won’t speak for all State officers; some actually are wimps. That’s not the case for most of them, though, as many do live brave lives.

By 2003, and therefore the unstated time of the film, new protocols had been established between the FBI and State. State would work to ensure FBI access to sites, evidence, and suspects. Investigative teams would be of a manageable size and the agents would not bear arms unless specifically authorized to do so because of particular circumstances. The teams work under the leadership of the FBI’s Legal Attaché and under the authority of the Ambassador. The LEGATTs, as they are called, know the territory and just what they can and cannot do. The film wanders into a bit of fantasy as its FBI team breaks command structures and simply shows up in Riyadh without Department of Justice authorization. A move like this would have led to instant firing. Nor could their plane have entered Saudi airspace without clearance from the Saudi government, through the US Embassy.

All in all, though, this is a good film. It’s not the very best action film you’ve ever seen and some of the intended laughs fall flat. There’s lots of shooting and explosions, running around and fast car chases. But there’re also occasions in which the viewer is asked to think about the fact that it’s not only the victims who are human, but those who try to do their jobs in the midst of confusion, emotional turmoil, and the threat of further deadly attacks. Here, the film shines.

This part of the story is carried by excellent acting by the principal actors: Jamie Foxx, heading the FBI’s team, and Ashraf Barhom, leading the Saudi police effort. Both show the awkwardness in dealing with complete strangers, fighting against the stereotypes they carry in their own minds. Jason Bateman and Ali Suliman have perhaps the most subtle performances as, respectively, an FBI agent who learns that ‘kick ass’ is not always the best procedure, and a Saudi police sergeant who puts duty to his country above all else. I think Chris Cooper isn’t asked to do much and I guess Jennifer Garner is there because the producers thought they needed some sort of female presence. She adds nothing.

If you’re looking for a film that bashes Saudis or the Administration, this isn’t the film for you. If instead you want a film that accurately portrays the complexity of US-Saudi relations at both official and personal levels, a film that shows how Saudi society itself is trying to come to terms with terrorism, then you don’t want to miss it.

The structural problem was the rampant anti-Americanism. I hate being predictable, but here goes: I get that the Bourne movies are anti-imperial; I get that the U.S. government is doing shady stuff at Langley and that Treadstone is a scary program; but the first two movie handled these worldviews with some real artfulness. Ultimatum has none of that. We’ve got Noah Vosen running around New York shouting for assets and agents–even analysts–to kill, kill, kill–Bourne, journalists, other CIA officers, whoever. He does all of this with the goal not of protecting national security or even his bureaucratic turf, but simply, as he puts it, “to win.” Win what? Oh, I get it, that’s the point. What a silly imperialist I am.

In the course of trying to win for no reason, the CIA kills people with black bags over their heads and uses bombs to blow up cars in the street. Any of this sound familiar? At all? Like from the recent past? There’s something peculiar about a culture which, faced with a terrible enemy, makes movies depicting the enemy’s wretched crimes, but ascribing that behavior instead to their native land.

I haven’t seen this movie yet but plan to do so. My wife and I enjoyed the first two installments very much and own them on DVD. But I’m with Last here: ham handed anti-Americanism in American pop culture is quite bizarre.

The CIA run amok is a stock plot device, really, and is arguably more anti-Big Government than anti-American. But the easy moral equivalency between the United States and our enemies is beyond banal; it’s insulting and dispiriting.

Then again, I’m not sure where the near-consensus among movie critics that Michael Bay makes terrible moves comes from. For example, a profile in the most recent Details observes,

You most likely already have strong opinions about Bay, and not the good kind. People who care about culture and quality brand Bay and his oeuvre as shamefully, offensively hollow. It doesn’t matter that he owns a private jet, that he dates Playboy Playmates, that he lives bigger and badder than you ever will—he is Carrot Top with a megaphone.

Yet, of the handful of his movies I’ve seen, the only one I didn’t like at all was “Pearl Harbor.” I haven’t seen any of his various horror flicks, but then that’s not a genre I tend to enjoy. Nor have I seen “Playboy Video Centerfold: Kerri Kendall (One woman’s erotic, imaginative adventure)” but, really, how bad could it be?

“The Rock” was fun even if the plot was rather far-fetched. “Bad Boys” was funny; “Bad Boys II,” meanwhile, looked so obviously bad that I never bothered to see it. And I’m apparently the only one who liked “Armageddon,” which even star Bruce Willis routinely mocks.

Sure, none of them are exactly Shakespeare. And they’re not likely to have the long term cultural impact of “Star Wars,” “Indiana Jones,” or “Rocky.” But so what?

Bay doesn’t pretend he’s making art; he’s just making entertaining movies people want to see. Judging by the results, he’s succeeding.