Zero Dark Thirty

[dashrendar44]

The movie is very biased and not objective though.

[Lordmandeep]

You can say that about torture scenes...However the film never questioned killing Bin Laden...and only a bleeding heart, out of touch elitist douchbag would.

[dashrendar44]

Well, I saw that movie not to see Bin Laden bleeding face full frontal but to see the depiction of the process that led to that.

[Lordmandeep]

The film hardly showed that...

 

Lol if the film was being biased...

 

Heroic music would have played and you would have seen Bin Laden's face and the Seal team member looking at eachother...

 

They would have exchanged menacing looks and the Seal time would a fired a bullet with a grin on his face...while the Bullet hits him in slow motion and the Music erupts in jingoistic triumph.

 

 

lol

[dashrendar44]

The movie is biased since we follow the hunt and behind the scenes from Maya's POV most of the time...

 

A war/spy movie can be biased in more ways than looking like a Bruckeimer's jingoistic production.

Edited January 28, 2013 by dashrendar44

[Lordmandeep]

Here in North America people have been going after the film for being so neutral that it gets boring...

[dashrendar44]

That's fake neutrality, IMO. How can you be neutral when your central character is Maya and the progress of the events are centered around her (with no real character development whatsoever)? That's what bugging me with the "objective" or "neutral" pseudo-non bias mantra of the filmmakers since they're depicting (and romancing) events from some CIA executives POV claimed as their only sources. The film is written by a former embedded journalist...

 

When I heard people cheered (America F*ck Yeah!) during Bin Laden's take down reconstitution in that house like it's the unquestionable truth being told for them, I find that very ludicrous.

Edited January 29, 2013 by dashrendar44

[Gopher]

Maybe not the main character since it was well known in reality she was headstrong and obsessive about catching Bin laden whatever means necessary but none of the other characters questionned the morality of torture either. Especially when you have Mark Strong's character infuriated that they can't torture anymore to gain intel since detainees are lawyered. And that's problematic because in reality there was clearly dissenting opinions among CIA operatives about the morality of torture. The movie failed to depict that point.

 

You're wrong. 

 

The entire point of the film is summed up in a single moment. Jason Clarke's character, clearly disturbed by the amount of torture he has done in the name of defending America, has reached his breaking point. He can't work in the field anymore. He shows it in his eyes when he's telling Maya, but then tries to shrug it off in a moment in a homophobic, tough guy manner, saying "I'm tired of seeing so many naked dudes." 

 

It's an incredible moment of characterization and shows everything the film has to say about torture: these people, whether the end goal was successful or not, have to live with what they have done. Torture was convenient and certainly some characters like Mark Strong's wished they could continue doing it. But he wasn't torturing people himself. Maya and Dan were, and they are broken before the end of the film. Zero Dark Thirty makes deeply profound points under the 'docu-drama' sheen of accuracy and reality, which makes its assessments of the concepts of torture, morality and vengeance all the more effective. 

 

If you're looking for movie in which someone gives a rousing speech at the end about why torturing was wrong, you're not going to find it. Bigelow leaves it to her viewers to be smart enough to assess the effect the bin Laden search had on Maya and Dan and the rest. And frankly you'd have to be blind if you think the movie depicts torture in any positive light, or the ending is in any way presented in a "America f**k yeah!" tone. 

[dashrendar44]

When the movie clearly shows that torture played a major role in finding and killing Bin Laden even if CIA debunked that claim in reality, that's giving torture more power that it really has. That's endorsing War On Terror program and credited its success on killing Bin Laden. Even if "Enhanced interrogation program" constitutes a war crime. In the end, that piece of "Art" delivers in an insidious way that war crime and violating Geneva conventions is ok in the name of Democracy and Liberty since it helps gaining reliable intel.

 

Please, don't tell me that cringe last scene is character development meaning she's "broken" or that guy saying he's retiring because torture messed him up for no reason that the script wanted him out of the picture to focus on Maya. That's ridiculous. That's not profound, that's fiction cliche "tired of this shit" trope. Characters motivations and their morality are barely touched upon nor explored (Never debated too) during that 10 years (?!) hunt. Maya has no character development or meaty background exposed during that 10 years gap, she doesn't even age, she's an allegory, a shell not an actual character. It's too factual (no geopolitics context analysis, that's upsetting when you make a movie on such politically charged topic) and uneven like checking the box. The movie turned out to be as vain and empty as her main character is at the end of it.

Edited January 29, 2013 by dashrendar44

[Gopher]

When the movie clearly shows that torture played a major role in finding and killing Bin Laden even if CIA debunked that claim in reality, that's giving torture more power that it really has. That's endorsing War On Terror program and credited its success on killing Bin Laden. Even if "Enhanced interrogation program" constitutes a war crime. In the end, that piece of "Art" delivers in an insidious way that war crime and violating Geneva conventions is ok in the name of Democracy and Liberty since it helps gaining reliable intel.

 

I don't know how to respond to that. You saw a completely different film than me. 

Edited January 29, 2013 by Gopher

[The Dark Alfred]

I don't think it really showed the dark side, only segments of it. Otherwise it would have focused on what actually did not happen. The main reason why it's so obviously a BS story (which as I said I don't mind, I rate it as a movie, that's fine by me) that this film was in pre-production even before Bin Laden was killed.

[The Futurist]

I don't think it really showed the dark side, only segments of it. Otherwise it would have focused on what actually did not happen. The main reason why it's so obviously a BS story (which as I said I don't mind, I rate it as a movie, that's fine by me) that this film was in pre-production even before Bin Laden was killed.

 I think you missed a lot.

 

The movie Bigelow was preparing was very different even if the subject was still Ousama 's hunt.

The movie was actually about the failure of the search ...

 

The raid changed everything and they dumped  the script they had to re-do everything.

[Gopher]

It's nice to finally agree with The Futurist on something 

[acsc1312]

It's nice to finally agree with ANYONE on something 

 

FIFY

[dashrendar44]

 I think you missed a lot.

 

The movie Bigelow was preparing was very different even if the subject was still Ousama 's hunt.

The movie was actually about the failure of the search ...

 

The raid changed everything and they dumped  the script they had to re-do everything.

 

 

And it shows, it's a rush out job.

Edited January 29, 2013 by dashrendar44

[Lordmandeep]

Actually if Bin Laden was still alive it would likley been a much more darker film..It would have been, its been a waste of time... The film gets rather dark in the start but you know in the end they suceed...Leading to a much more lighter and imo better film..Imagine if the film was all about torture, blah

[Heretic]

I could've watched Jessica Chastain for triple the time. Her performance was remarkable and really quite captivating, and it kept me thoroughly interested throughout. For that, I hope she wins best actress.But my god, I don't think I've ever shaked as much in a film as I did in the last 20 minutes of this. I was genuinely terrified, which just goes to show how effective the scene actually was. I also don't think I've ever jumped as much as I did in this film. Some of the bomb scenes literally had me catapulting out of my seat. What I loved about this is that it felt so real. Not storytelling, just an eye opening reality of what humans are capable of.I'd rank it just below Perks and Django. A

[Jack Nevada]

What a terrific film this is. ZDT is immersive, intricate and intense, making it one of my favorite films from last year.

 

My favorite actress Jessica Chastain plays a character that we really dont know much about, but she makes her into a compelling character that is not unlike Mark Zuckerberg in The Social Network. Chastain is worth the hype, she carries the first two hours brilliantly. Rest of the cast are unfortunately reduced to non-characters, but standouts include Jason Clarke and Jennifer Ehle. People have accused it of being pro-torture, but I dont think its really pro anything. It doesn't make a stand, it just kinda clinically shows the events without making a statement one way or the other. 

This just such a well made political thriller, that keeps you very much interested throughout its looong runtime. I was never bored, and I'd totally watch this again. 

 

5/5

[Claire of Themyscira]

I still can't get over how mindbogglingly amazing this was.

[rahvinn87]

It amazes me how different people can watch this and come away with COMPLETELY different views on how the film portrayed torture and it's effectiveness.

 

I personally completely agree with Gopher. I don't have time to elaborate more now, but I came away from this feeling that the film makers went out of their way to present a negative view of torture. To me it screamed 'look at all these years we have wasted torturing people when if we had just stopped and looked at the information we had already we might have found him long ago'.

 

I will expand further later, but boy was I shocked when I looked over the internet and these forums after seeing the film last night (I had done well to insulate myself from the controversy!).