Jamie Foxx, Chris Cooper Jennifer Garner, Jason Bateman,Ashraf Barhom
Director: Peter Berg
Written by Matthew Michael Carnahan
[before breaking open a door in terrorist apartment]
Ronald Fleury: Which side do you think Allah's on?
Colonel Faris Al Ghazi: We are about to find out!
Visceral. That’s the word to describe this gritty thriller. It is a detective story set in the kingdom of Saudi Arabia. A suicide attack in an American compound in Saudi Arabia leads to massive carnage and collateral damage. A crack FBI unit is given 5 days to investigate.
The cinematography is excellent, so too the action, and the setting is one you have not seen before. It transplants the viewer into the dust and debris of a faraway country. This is a film that gets down and dirty, allowing the viewer some very poignant, at times touching, close-ups of a community we tend to see otherwise defined in brash broad strokes.
The flick is riveting for a number of other reasons too. The opening ‘News’ montage makes one wonder which is more important: our perception of reality, the degree to which that perception ‘entertains’ us, or reality itself? Or is it our response to this perceived reality that is all defining, all important? Do convoys really travel at 150km/h in 5 vehicle fleets over their superhighways, sometimes accompanied by a low-flying Blackhawk? Imagine the same scenario on the M1 in Johannesburg, or in Seoul, London or New York? The always imminent threat of destruction is portrayed effectively, so much so that one starts to taste metal in one’s mouth halfway through. Some of the desperate fight-for-your-life sequences in confined spaces reminded me of Bourne, and there was something else too: Syriana perhaps, in the khaki coloring, the black vehicles and vibrant plumes of orange fire erupting at frequent intervals in urban settings.
Three quarters of the way through this film I began to ask questions. They are the same questions I asked after 9/11. Is vengeance justified? Isn’t the principle of payback the way to war? And The Kingdom is all about the nuts and bolts of vengeance. Did they make this movie to demonstrate American superiority? To demonstrate America’s efficiency at equally massive, equally lethal retribution? Was it not-so-subtle propaganda? Or was it a highly focused glimpse into the details of the human condition in Saudi Arabia?
The main Saudi character who assists the FBI squad (Colonel Faris Al Ghazi competently portrayed by Ashraf Barhom) is stern but likable, and it is through him that we see the other side of Saudi Arabia. The sense, the integrity, the discipline, the conscience and the love of a man for his country. We also learn exactly what role, and what issues, the Saudi Royal family, particularly the prince, has to deal with. If you are still in any doubt about just how simple, and terrible the internecine conflict is in The Kingdom (and elsewhere, Israel for one), wait for the last scene of this film. As it turns out we may well be judged by the same sometimes brutal instinctual standards that we apply to others. Therein lies the lesson. If we do not find a way to understand our enemy, and for them to understand us, we may all – all – be eviscerated in the destruction that sweeps us into it. And vengeance is our common path to this destruction.
I was embued with a studious compassion for those in the Kingdom who might be on our side, and a more reserved sense of judgement for those who are against us. The Kingdom speaks eloquently about the visceral terror that was, and may yet be in store.
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