Comments on: Syriana: A Review.

By: Ann

Ann — Tue, 27 Dec 2005 17:03:44 +0000

Supergenius, I was going to suggest you submit that review to Four Word Film Reviews, but somebody beat you to it.

By: Bob

Bob — Tue, 20 Dec 2005 18:51:41 +0000

I saw this a couple weeks ago… Am I the only one who didn’t really get into Traffic but love this movie? Is that allowed?

By: Ronan

Ronan — Tue, 20 Dec 2005 14:18:32 +0000

Saw it last night. The single best thing we can all do to save the world? Conserve energy. Oh, and we should be very afraid of madrasas.

By: R.W. Rasband

R.W. Rasband — Sat, 17 Dec 2005 00:50:39 +0000

I don’t have to see it, thank God. That’s why we have movie critics and the occasional intelligent observer like Cohen.

By: Bryce I

Bryce I — Fri, 16 Dec 2005 20:37:29 +0000

For an elitist contrary opinion, read Godfrey Cheshire's review here. And it's Gaghan with an 'n', for those of you Googling. Nice review, Supergenius. Although I guess if you want to be a supergenius, you can't admit you didn't know what the heck was going on.

By: NFlanders

NFlanders — Fri, 16 Dec 2005 03:16:43 +0000

I’ve read the memoir, See No Evil, that the Syriana is based on and I really don’t see how they could have turned that into a movie.

Basically the book is just a complaint against the Clinton administration and its selling out the National Security Council to Big Oil (ironic in view of today’s conventional wisdom).

By: Supergenius

Supergenius — Fri, 16 Dec 2005 01:23:44 +0000

R.W., “lefty cartoon” is too much (esp. for someone who hasn’t seen it). Was TRAFFIC a lefty cartoon? If so, it was a remarkably well-done cartoon.

By: Elisabeth

Elisabeth — Fri, 16 Dec 2005 01:17:27 +0000

Excellent review, Supergenius. I saw this movie last week, and thoroughly enjoyed it until I read the NY Times review (and others) that pointed out the flaws that I missed while captivated by the story.

I’m no fan of conspiracy theories (which is why I didn’t much like “The Constant Gardener”), but I think Syriana does a good job of portraying how a small group of people (oil companies, Middle Eastern heads of state) control the destinies of millions. The poor Muslim boy who becomes indoctrinated with radical Islam is a perfect example of how we’re all just cogs in the machine – so we’d better take our chances at glory whenever we can.

I also liked Jeffrey Wright. He was phenomenal. And what a paradigm shift from his role as the gay nurse in “Angels in America”!

Great review, thanks.

By: R.W. Rasband

R.W. Rasband — Fri, 16 Dec 2005 00:06:35 +0000

I have no desire to see this movie as it appears to be yet another lefty cartoon, as liberal columnist Richard Cohen is forced to admit:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/12/12/AR2005121201251.html

By: Supergenius

Supergenius — Thu, 15 Dec 2005 22:45:16 +0000

Eric, I plead diff’rent strokes on that issue. I found that things started off with enough of an introduction for me to follow, but it was definitely sparse. I admit that another minute or two wouldn’t have hurt, but I’m not sure it would have fit in with the overall narrative.

The film has kind of in medias res structure, which is tough at first, but again this is part of the worldview, similar to TRAFFIC, where we examine a tranche of the timeline as life goes by. The filmmaker here isn’t telling a story, he’s slicing a bit of life for us to examine, like removing a section of a tree limb. The idea of a beginning and an end would have been against the concept of reality: i.e., that this whole thing started long, long ago, and it continues long, long after the curtain rises.