Review: The Hurt Locker

The Hurt Locker

OPENING: 06/24/2009

STUDIO: Summit Entertainment

ACCOMPLICES:
Trailer, Official Site

SOUNDTRACK: Not yet available

The Charge
You don’t have to be a hero to do this job. But it helps.

Opening Statement
Since the U.S. Military has been at war in Iraq for quite some time, you would think Hollywood would have produced a generous handful of compelling and insightful films on the subject. Such has not been the case. Most of the Iraq movies to date have been underwhelming, and the audience response to those movies even more so. That finally changes with The Hurt Locker, a dynamic thriller from director Katheryn Bigelow that unquestionably keeps moviegoers on the edge of their seats.

Facts of the Case
The film follows an Army bomb squad unit which spends most of its time seeking out and defusing dangerous explosives. Such things seem to turn up with surprising frequency, but Staff Sergeant Will James (Jeremy Renner, 28 Weeks Later) is always up to the task. He has personally defused over 800 bombs. Each time he straps on his protective suit and heads towards his latest assignment it’s a new gamble, but James’ precision and expertise provide him a better chance than most. However, a thrill seeking side causes him to behave in ways that greatly disturb his right-hand men, Sergeant JT Sanborn (Anthony Mackie, Million Dollar Baby) and Specialist Owen Eldridge (Brian Geraghty, I Know Who Killed Me). As the missions continue, the tension between them rises. Will they make it to the end of their tour alive?

The Evidence
What The Hurt Locker has to say about soldiers and the nature of war is honest, if not particularly new or revolutionary — War is Hell; it mentally traumatizes many of the people it doesn’t physically kill; some soldiers get addicted to the rush of dangerous situations; and life feels somewhat dull when that rush is gone. These are the same messages (or variations thereof) other movies have provided, the difference being The Hurt Locker is less preoccupied with sermonizing and considerably more focused on providing a tightly crafted film. Politics and messages aside (though such elements are handled wisely), this is first and foremost a tremendous thriller.

Bigelow dives into suspense-laden action from the very first scene, only allowing the movie to come up for air briefly between set pieces. Each major sequence is a relentless exercise in Hitchcockian tension; from the opening bomb-defusing attempt and tenacious sniper battle to the challenging decisions that must be made in the third act. Don’t let the casual acting style and queasy-cam cinematography fool you. Some of this stuff may feel improvised, but this is tightly organized and well-crafted filmmaking. Bigelow throws you right into the action, in a manner that occasionally recalls Clouzot’s The Wages of Fear, with sequence after sequence bringing additional suspense to the table. Violent explosions are employed frequently enough to make every moment seem like a potentially fatal one, but not often enough to soften the blow of the violent events that actually occur.

The quiet beats in the film are short, essential, intentionally restless, and awkward. It would seem some of these men simply don’t know what to do with themselves when they aren’t on the battlefield. There is a moment that initially seems like playfully innocent roughhousing, but we quickly realize the two men involved are inflicting genuine pain on each other. This is partially because they are frustrated with each other and eager to get it out of their system, but mostly because they’ve come to a point where such extremities are needed to simply be able to feel something. What they do and what they see has made them numb to the minor pains and pleasures of life. Once you’ve felt the life-or-death terror of defusing a weapon that could blow you to kingdom come, most other stuff doesn’t cut it.

The cast is uniformly solid across the board, from relative unknowns like Anthony Mackie and Brian Geraghty to old pros like Guy Pearce, David Morse, and Ralph Fiennes. Still, the movie belongs to Jeremy Renner, whose work here may very well earn him an Oscar nomination. He takes a character who moves along a rather familiar path and somehow manages to avoid all of the standard acting choices such a role ordinarily inspires while also seeming thoroughly believable at every turn. His sense of adventure does not lead him into foolish cowboy behavior, only the appearance of such. His actions are fine-tuned and carefully-planned to the Nth degree. The film plunges into some challenging areas, over the course of its 127-minute runtime, and Renner is up to task every step of the way.

Closing Statement
I may find The Hurt Locker less than a revolutionary statement on warfare, but as a piece of cinema I have intense admiration for it. This film grabs the viewer from moment one and doesn’t let go. It’s a hardcore slice of professional filmmaking, putting most of this summer’s action films to shame and bringing considerable emotional weight to its thrills.

The Verdict
9/10

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