What Happened? & Body of Lies

What Happened?

Quite the correct title. How do you screw up a Barry Levinson directed Bobby DeNiro, Bruce Willis, and a plethora of other excellent castings? The title alone should have been fair warning to whomever backed this. Note to Hollywood: When making a comedy, add jokes, or something funny.

4/10

Body Of Lies

Ridley Scott is a favored director because Blade Runner is a masterpiece. With this he basically set his film Kindom Of Heaven (review for that sometime, but a quick score for the curious, 10/10) in the current Middle East situation. Now, I, like the rest of America, am not really interested in the billion or so Iraq movies that Hollywood has been pumping out. Most are a trainwreck of filmmaking (Syrianna, 2/10), incredibly biased, or kind of depressing (The Kingdom, 7.5/10), and no matter which side of that fence you're on, it doesn't usually make for good entertainment. There are a few gems out there, but too many that follow the aforementioned faults to merit slogging through them all.

All that being said, I quite enjoyed this one. I think it caught a great feel for the reality of what the situation is, without being preachy. And that goes a long way.

Also, did I mention that Ridley Scott is one hell of a filmmaker?

9/10

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