Tuesday, February 19, 2008

Rendition (2007)

The director of the Academy Award-winning 2006 crime drama Tsotsi returns to the helm with this tale of a Middle East CIA operative who begins to have doubts about his latest assignment after witnessing the interrogation of a suspected suicide bomber by secret police. When Egyptian-born chemical engineer Anwar El-Ibrahimi (Omar Metwalli) mysteriously vanishes on a routine flight from South Africa to Washington, his wife Isabella (Reece Witherspoon) embarks on a frantic international search for her missing husband. At the same time, a CIA analyst (Jake Gyllenhaal) arrives at a clandestine detention facility outside of United States. As the interrogation of El-Ibrahimi gets underway, the CIA analyst is profoundly shaken by the unorthodox methods used by the man's captors, and quickly begins to reevaluate his assignment. Peter Sarsgaard, Meryl Streep, and Alan Arkin co-star in a topical political thriller penned by Kelley Sane and produced by Steve Golin. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide

Running Time: 122 mins
Rendition (2007)
Just a poor quality drama-IMO. Nothing sticks out as really earthshaking revelations. One person got caught up in the GWOT, and suffered. Yes that was a tragedy but compared to millions dieing all over the world, I can find other tragedies to mourn more important than US bashing. I see why it was quickly released to video as the acting and the dramatic effects were non-plus in this film.

Maybe I had already read enough about it ahead of time, but it did not even provoke an emotional response. The use of real life and documentary styles in this film failed miserably. It would have been better to make it one or the other.

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