Screening Log

This new site feature is a collective effort to summarize our viewing habits. Occasionally, you will find titles here that are coming to a theater near you, in addition to films viewed on television, and even films viewed in piecemeal. The screening log is archived each month; to view past entries select a month in the menu below.

February 2006 activity

Total Log Entries: 47

Total Comments: 35

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Syriana / USA / 2005

An attempt to do for the oil business what writer- director Stephen Gaghan’s Traffic did for drugs, Syriana is a large- canvas international thriller with the now- standard interweaving plotlines, disparate (and desperate) characters and lots of sweaty, balding men in white shirts pointing at each other and shouting. Sadly, it doesn’t add up to much more- the film is rather empty, trying to make up in noise and flashy editing what it lacks in character development and intrigue.

Syriana is politically adventurous, pointing fingers directly at US government and big business. But the most potentially controversial aspect- a storyline involving two Arab suicide bombers in training- is also the most underrepresented, as though the producers were eager to display their shock- tactic credentials but unwilling to take too much of a risk; Gaghan never attempts any real insight into these boys’ lives. There’s much to appreciate here- a suitably grizzly performance from George Clooney, some nicely barren landscape photography- but the structure feels overly familiar, the characters half- sketched, the conclusions predictable.

by Tom Huddleston | Source: 35mm print
17 Feb 2006 6:00 AM | Submit Comment

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