The Hurt Locker

THE HURT LOCKER
OPTIMUM RELEASING
RELEASED 28 August 2009
Not only is ‘The Hurt Locker’ the first great movie I’ve seen set in war-torn Iraq, it’s also the most original war movie I can remember. It’s no flight of fancy to say ‘The Hurt Locker’ should go down as the definitive record of the daily struggle in Baghdad as much as ‘Apocalypse Now’ encompasses the lunacy of the Vietnam war and ‘Saving Private Ryan’ visualises the mad horror of Omaha Beach.
It’s summer 2004, and Sergeant James (Jeremy Renner) takes over a bomb disposal team specifically trained to handle the homemade bombs (IEDs, Improvised Explosive Devices) that account for more than half of American hostile deaths, killing thousands of Iraqis too. His unconventional methods put his two subordinates, Sergeant JT Sanborn and Specialist Owen Eldridge (Anthony Mackie and Brian Geraghty), at extreme unease. It doesn’t seem to matter what they try to do to rein James in, he just gets a little crazier and reckless with each deadly mission. Whether that means covertly entering a suspected terrorist building or enduring a tense stand-off with snipers in the middle of the desert, it’s all a game to Sergeant James.
Jeremy Renner is the star of ‘The Hurt Locker’ and it’s an eye-catching performance in the same way that Eric Bana broke through with ‘Chopper’ or Mel Gibson exploded onto the screen in ‘Mad Max’ (an about-to-be newly-launched franchise that Renner has actually recently screen-tested for). He has madness in his eyes, but a calm sense of destiny too. Even though part of him yearns for the quiet life with his wife and child, you know that a life of shopping and suburbia just isn’t in James’ DNA. He longs for the thrill of the chase, and of adding another kill-switch to his collection. As the opening quote of the movie declares, ‘The rush of battle is often a potent and lethal addiction, for war is a drug’ (from renowned Middle East correspondent Chris Hedges’ book ‘War Is A Force That Gives Us Meaning’).
Journalist Mark Boal wrote the screenplay, drawing from his experiences embedded with a disposal team in Iraq in 2004. Kathryn Bigelow directs, fashioning her biggest success to date in a stop-start career (‘Near Dark’ ‘87, ‘Point Break’ ‘91, ‘Strange Days’ ‘95) that has finally seen her fulfill the promise shown in those movies. Bigelow knows exactly how to direct tense, explosive action, and hopefully her talent will get the chance to be developed further after the unanimous critical praise received for this movie. She seems perfect for the re-invigorated Bond franchise. In fact, one of my favourite sequences from the film is where Sergeant James actually goes all ‘Bond’ on a solo nightime mission and, armed only with a hand pistol, breaks in to a suspected terrorist’s home. Unlike the movies however, life is all about shades of grey and justifiable action, and James realises he has no idea what he’s doing!
‘The Hurt Locker’ some visually-arresting slow-motion shots of dirt jumping up off the burnt-out rooftops of cars, as well as the sheer power of the explosions which throw people around like rag dolls. But army life in Iraq is never glamorized, and there are plenty of grisly and sad moments, perhaps the worst being a sickening ‘body bomb’, quite literally a dead person packed with explosives and left by the roadside for unexpecting soldiers to find. You’d need a bullet lodged in your noggin to want to be anywhere near this.
‘The Hurt Locker’ is one of the best films of the 2009. At it’s heart, you have a tragic story about one man’s addiction to risk. As a war movie, it convincingly captures the confusion in Iraq at a turning point in history, and I can’t imagine another film doing it better.
FIVE OUT OF FIVE