Word: film
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Shot and projected digitally instead of on film, the picture gains in gradations of night shades but loses in visual clarity. Some shots look like iPhone photos enlarged to 50 feet; any sharp camera movement results in a blur. The same has to be said for the movie. It lacks overall focus, and at the end you may have a question for Michael Mann: Why'd you bother...
DISCONTINUED After a 74-year run, Kodachrome, the world's first commercially successful color film, was pulled by the Eastman Kodak Co. because of declining demand...
These worthy films were based on fact and told a microscopic truth, but they left untold the larger ache of an Iraq tour: how men in peril survive. Finally comes The Hurt Locker, a scary, thrilling patrol of those Baghdad streets by men who defuse IEDs. Written by journalist Mark Boal (whose reporting was the basis for Elah) and directed by action-movie maven Kathryn Bigelow, this film looks, feels and smells real; you'll need to rinse off the grit after seeing...
...Ralph Fiennes) in the desert, James is a marvel to see in action. He has the cool aplomb, analytical acumen and attention to detail of a great athlete or a master serial killer--anyway, some gifted obsessive. A quote from Iraq expert Chris Hedges that opens the film reads, "War is a drug." Movies often editorialize on this theme: the man who's a misfit back home but an efficient, imaginative killing machine on the battlefield. Bigelow and Boal aren't after that. They're saying that, in such an infernal peacekeeping operation, the Army needs guys like James...
...vice versa; so James is often isolated from his comrades, while he gets into recklessly close contact with the Iraqis. Bigelow is also a whiz at discovering fresh talent, and in Renner she hit the jackpot. The actor is ordinary-looking, pudgy-faced, quiet; can he carry a big film? Oh, yes. He soon reveals the strength, confidence and unpredictability of a young Russell Crowe...