Based
on actual events, this story takes place in Karachi Pakistan, just
after the 911 tragedy and follows a Wall Street Journal journalist
named Daniel Pearl who was researching a story about the Shoe
Bomber, Richard Reid. As his research deepens, Daniel goes missing.
Meanwhile, his wife Mariane Pearl, also a journalist and six months
pregnant, embarks on a grueling search for her husband with local
and American authorities. International intrigue ensues.
This
movie was
good and the acting was great. In fact, I’d go as far as to say that
it’s one of those stories that needs to be told. That said, I’m
not quite sure that it needed to be told on the big screen,
necessarily. It was just missing certain qualities that would have
given it better entertainment
value. This was more of an "informative" political piece
in that it outlined and showed the steps in recovering Daniel Pearl.
At the end of it all, the filmmakers and actors really did a great
job because I left feeling really empty and terrible for Mariane and
her unborn child. Not that I like to have that kind of feeling when
I walk out of a theater, but this is not one of those stories that
is gonna make you feel all fuzzy inside.
Angelina
Jolie plays Pearl’s wife Mariane. She played her character so
well that I didn’t see Angelina…I just saw Mariane Pearl. Jolie
brought this intense strength and courage to the character that was
great to watch and I don’t care what anybody says about her accent
in this movie, it was totally believable and even a little sexy!
Michael Winterbottom did an interesting job
with the directing. The beginning had a great build-up as you
started to feel stressed as you anticipated the big moment to come,
and yet you had no idea when it would happen. Unfortunately, it
started to slow down right after the capture and before you knew it,
it really dragged on. Even the characters were hard to follow, but
maybe that was just me. Visually, it had a Soderbergh flavor to it;
some of the shots reminded me of similar ones from TRAFFIC. What I
particularly liked about the film was how the Pakistan
authorities’ involvement with the case was illustrated. Their
relentless determination and extreme force to find this guy was a
real eye-opener. The fact that their only leads were e-mail IP’s
and cell phone numbers made it all that much more impressive.
Like I said though, it was an important story
to tell, but I don’t think it’s one of those flicks that I could
recommend that you run out and see. I don’t want to say that
Hollywood should have stuck their hands into this story and made it
a little more "flashy", but I’m sure the filmmakers want
as many people to see this movie as possible, so maybe they could
have tweaked it a little more for the big screen. Basically, this
film will not interest everyone. Those of you who like
political turmoil or (a bit of) a longwinded story may like this.
Others, well, you know what to do.
— by Tim
Goernert