Hurt Locker Review
by Cameron Klales and Daniel Tuveson
The Hurt Locker is extremely well written. Everything that happens in the movie happens in real time. This gives the actors, an excellent cast by the way, an opportunity to demonstrate the little idiosyncrasies that we ignore most of the time and force you to notice them. The film is very slow moving, but you will never feel bored. One of the slowest scenes in the movie is also it’s most intense film sequence. The main characters engage in a sniper’s duel with a band of terrorists. The duel takes place over about ten minutes, and revolves primarily around two shots, one is through the scope of the protagonist’s rifle, and the other is a close up of the Sanborn’s face. You see each shot hit the sand, and the two parties are far enough away from each other than you have to wait for a while before you see the shot hit anything. This adds suspense a moment of suspense after every shot. About halfway through the duel, the gun jams and there is an intense sequence of cleaning the bullet.
The Hurt Locker is not a movie of Motifs. We don't know how we feel about this. On one hand, the lack of sub plots makes it much easier to focus on the main plot and character development. On the other hand, for what is supposed to be a military operation in an active war zone, there seems to be a complete lack of people. Military or otherwise. The only people in the movie are the ones who are directly relevant to the plot. It's hard to tell if the bleakness of the movie is intentional or not.
Within the first few moments of the movie we see a team of soldiers preparing to defuse a bomb. First, one soldier tries to use a small robot to manipulate the explosives to disarm them, but upon the robot breaking, has to fix it himself. This scene sets the uneasy tone of the entire movie showing the soldiers searching the bystanders on the street for a person with a detonator, using rapid changes in shot and kinetic camerawork.
Early in the film, enthusiastic colonel William befriends a local soccer playing bootleg DVD peddler, Beckham. Later on in the movie Beckham is killed by a group of terrorists and Will kidnaps the shopkeeper of the DVD stand and attempts to find his assailants. When reprimanded by a soldier for leaving at such unusual hours, he lies, saying that he was at a whorehouse. This movie does a phenomenal job showing the complexity of the emotional turmoil that soldiers in Iraq are constantly faced with. The soldiers bury their anger towards the war when in combat, but many of them have emotional breakdowns when the dust settles. The only character who enjoys the thrill of facing death is William James, who leaves his wife and infant son to defuse bombs thousands of miles away.
A few unnerving bits of mise en scene show us the true horrors of war. A bomb goes off destroying a large apartment building throwing pieces of people’s bodies and destroy possessions into a mass of rubble. The camera follows the nerve wracked soldier Owen Eldridge through the destruction. We see people praying over dead or near dead loved ones, a child’s shoe, people screaming, sirens, and walls of fire. Eldridge, excellently played by Brian Geraghty, looks around, helpless to aid the destruction and can only witness the catastrophic consequences of war.
Overall, the movie is a great way to spend two hours of your life. It has intense character development and the plot moves forward continuously and at a speed that keeps you interested without overwhelming you. However, it isn’t a light watch. This is not a movie to see for fun with your friends. It’s more the kind of thing you’d want to watch with a film club or somewhere else you could discuss it.
Sources:
1. Bigelow, Kathryn, dir. The Hurt Locker. Universal Studios, 2009. Film. 13 Mar 2014.
by Cameron Klales and Daniel Tuveson
The Hurt Locker is extremely well written. Everything that happens in the movie happens in real time. This gives the actors, an excellent cast by the way, an opportunity to demonstrate the little idiosyncrasies that we ignore most of the time and force you to notice them. The film is very slow moving, but you will never feel bored. One of the slowest scenes in the movie is also it’s most intense film sequence. The main characters engage in a sniper’s duel with a band of terrorists. The duel takes place over about ten minutes, and revolves primarily around two shots, one is through the scope of the protagonist’s rifle, and the other is a close up of the Sanborn’s face. You see each shot hit the sand, and the two parties are far enough away from each other than you have to wait for a while before you see the shot hit anything. This adds suspense a moment of suspense after every shot. About halfway through the duel, the gun jams and there is an intense sequence of cleaning the bullet.
The Hurt Locker is not a movie of Motifs. We don't know how we feel about this. On one hand, the lack of sub plots makes it much easier to focus on the main plot and character development. On the other hand, for what is supposed to be a military operation in an active war zone, there seems to be a complete lack of people. Military or otherwise. The only people in the movie are the ones who are directly relevant to the plot. It's hard to tell if the bleakness of the movie is intentional or not.
Within the first few moments of the movie we see a team of soldiers preparing to defuse a bomb. First, one soldier tries to use a small robot to manipulate the explosives to disarm them, but upon the robot breaking, has to fix it himself. This scene sets the uneasy tone of the entire movie showing the soldiers searching the bystanders on the street for a person with a detonator, using rapid changes in shot and kinetic camerawork.
Early in the film, enthusiastic colonel William befriends a local soccer playing bootleg DVD peddler, Beckham. Later on in the movie Beckham is killed by a group of terrorists and Will kidnaps the shopkeeper of the DVD stand and attempts to find his assailants. When reprimanded by a soldier for leaving at such unusual hours, he lies, saying that he was at a whorehouse. This movie does a phenomenal job showing the complexity of the emotional turmoil that soldiers in Iraq are constantly faced with. The soldiers bury their anger towards the war when in combat, but many of them have emotional breakdowns when the dust settles. The only character who enjoys the thrill of facing death is William James, who leaves his wife and infant son to defuse bombs thousands of miles away.
A few unnerving bits of mise en scene show us the true horrors of war. A bomb goes off destroying a large apartment building throwing pieces of people’s bodies and destroy possessions into a mass of rubble. The camera follows the nerve wracked soldier Owen Eldridge through the destruction. We see people praying over dead or near dead loved ones, a child’s shoe, people screaming, sirens, and walls of fire. Eldridge, excellently played by Brian Geraghty, looks around, helpless to aid the destruction and can only witness the catastrophic consequences of war.
Overall, the movie is a great way to spend two hours of your life. It has intense character development and the plot moves forward continuously and at a speed that keeps you interested without overwhelming you. However, it isn’t a light watch. This is not a movie to see for fun with your friends. It’s more the kind of thing you’d want to watch with a film club or somewhere else you could discuss it.
Sources:
1. Bigelow, Kathryn, dir. The Hurt Locker. Universal Studios, 2009. Film. 13 Mar 2014.