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The KingdomStarring Jamie Foxx, Chris Cooper, Jennifer Garner and Jason Bateman, Ashraf Barhom |
IN SHORT: An average flick, and thus a disappointment. [Rated R for intense sequences of graphic brutal violence, and for language. 110 minutes]
Two things we need to repeat, for those new to this Site: Cranky is both a native born New Yorker and a MOT -- we love that new bit of metaphor -- MOT is a sloppy anagram for Member of the Tribes, meaning we're Jewish. When it comes to anything regarding the middle east it's easy to assume where or loyalties lie.
We're watching movies here, folks. Politics have nothing to do with this, though the first minute or so of The Kingdom provides a better history of American/ Saudi Arabian relations than anything ever taught to the man sitting in the White House. You know, the guy who doesn't know the difference between being attacked by Saudi Arabians and Iraqis? [Here's the New York state of mind for the rest of you... George W. made his money in the oil business with Saudi Arabians. We're at war in Iraq because Adam Unseeing swore to kill George H. W. for humiliating him in the Gulf War. See? History! Fun! It's all a matter of follow the money, which is how the last Republican prez went down in flames. It's probably too late for that this time around, so here comes Hollywood, with a fictional story that gives us a reason to be pissed off at fictional Saudi Arabians!
We're not going to do the usual recap, thus ruining the First Act of The Kingdom, and we'd hate to ruin a great start when it isn't necessary. Let us just say that Arab terrorists pull one heck of an attack on the heavily guarded residential compound of Americans working in Arabia. Hundreds dead. It's enough of a provocation that the FBI decides to defy all State Department protocols and send a quartet of its best (Jamie Foxx, Chris Cooper, Jennifer Garner and Jason Bateman) overseas to hunt the bad guy(s) down. Y'see, attacks on Americans living on foreign soil come under FBI jurisdiction EXCEPT in the Arab World! no American investigators allowed into Saudi Arabia to even have a look at the criminal scene. No interviewing surviving witnesses without permission of the ruling prince. Major jurisdictional disputes between the Saudi police and Army and, of course, the whole mishegas of how the FBI gets their five days in the sun, carefully watched over and restricted in their movements by a local military official, Colonel Fars Al Ghazi (Ashraf Barhom), whose job is more to keep the four alive than to solve the murders.
So comes the middle of the film, in which nothing happens as various Saudis do their best to keep the four busy for the five days they are allowed to be "working" in the Kingdom. Then, almost as if sensing that the end is closing in on 'em and that things better get solved fast, the film drops a vital clue in Our Heroes laps and then cues the action sequences -- they're good, make no mistake about it -- that wrap the story and kill the bad guys and maybe some of the good guys and a whole bunch of Arabic day players and extras.
On average, a first run movie ticket will run you Ten Bucks. Were Cranky able to set his own price to The Kingdom , he would have paid . . .
$5.00
The big problem with The Kingdom is cultural. Westerners know what cop/ military investigation stories are supposed to look like. In this case, however, Our Investigators have cultural and language barriers to deal with. Jennifer Garner, indeed, all of the team is forbidden to touch a Muslim corpse. The local military and constabulary isn't pleased about having a woman on the US team and they don't quite seem to figure out that pronouncing Levitt with a French accent doesn't make it any less a Jewish name (it's explained away as a grandparent name, just the right thinning of blood that would've made the Gestapo happy).
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