Directed by:
Peter BergScreenplay:
Matthew Michael CarnahanCinematography:
Mauro FioreComposer:
Danny ElfmanCast:
Jamie Foxx, Chris Cooper, Jennifer Garner, Jason Bateman, Ashraf Barhom, Ali Suliman, Jeremy Piven, Richard Jenkins, Tim McGraw, Kyle Chandler, Frances Fisher (more)VOD (2)
Plots(1)
Thriller about a team of elite FBI agents sent to Saudi Arabia to solve a brutal mass murder and find a killer before he strikes again. Out of their element and under heavy fire, the team must join forces with their Saudi counterparts. As these unlikely allies begin to unlock the secrets of the crime scene, the team is led into a heart-stopping, do-or-die confrontation. (Universal Pictures US)
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Reviews (14)
A very strong four stars. Berg really knows his stuff. It begins with an ingenious collage of archive images of U.S - Arab relations combined with computer graphics. I'd even venture to guess that these are this year's most impressive opening titles. The approach to the subject is matter-of-fact, with no embellishments and unnecessary frills. The acting performances are all high caliber. I was very surprised by Jennifer Garner, the surprisingly "ordinary" Jason Bateman, and I have to take my hat off to the performance of the almost unknown Ashraf Barhom. The final action inferno ranks among this year's best, and I will stress once again that I don't mind shaky camera. So, my last words about the Kingdom? I'll just say this: In the end, we're all the same.
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Michael Mann has laid his guardian hands on Peter Berg and the result is a quite provocative contribution to the problem of the current sores of the Western world, i.e., terrorism emanating from Muslim countries. Yes, it's all driven by the mainstream, which doesn't allow it to be as biting in some ways as it might like, but the filmmakers still managed to go further than, for example, their colleagues with Blood Diamond. The film's train of thought is mainly that even an ordinary Muslim wants to be a peaceful person whose concerns are his faith and his own family, and that fanaticism is the work of others. Berg manages to imbue these interviews with a fair amount of authorial sensitivity, drawing decent truths about both worlds from the many words spoken. However, in order to avoid falling into boredom, he lets the actors deliver hard-hitting catchphrases and at the end, he serves up some major action that sits the viewer in their armchair in such a way that nothing that could match it this season will stick in the memory. The scene with the car-jacking and subsequent kidnapping is, in my opinion, the most effectively escalating scene of the year, which also ties in with the London station stakeout in The Bourne Ultimatum. As a person who studies the issues in the Middle East and terrorism, I was quite pleased with The Kingdom, but as a casual viewer, I was perfectly settled and entertained. PS: To say that it is mainly the work of Michael Mann is nonsense, if only for the different functionality and emotional impact of some scenes. It's like saying that Spielberg actually made Transformers and not Bay.
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The Kingdom is a precisely constructed and directed thriller with a generic plot that very much conforms to the American geopolitical agenda of the time, but also attempts to disguise its propagandistic dimension by building kitsch-laden sympathies for some of the characters of other nationalities. In the end, it even allows itself to poke at the supposed moral superiority and unambiguous firm resolve. But, of course, it remains solely at the level of an easily digestible mainstream flick that resolutely does not go against the grain. However, the effectively built team of main characters, each with their own role in the narrative, and especially the action are definitely worthy of praise. Though viewers will have to wait until the end for that, it is the natural culmination of the preceding events and the depicted characters, and above all it is realised with an outstanding symbiosis of dramatic construction, spatial topography, nervous camerawork and quick editing, as well as astonishing physical dynamics.
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Total satisfaction. Peter Berg serves up an interesting story that looks at the issues of the Western and Arab worlds in a quite clever way. Visually, the film is top notch from the first to the last second, Jamie Foxx is superb, and the final action set-piece is something that makes you want to take cover from bullets. I can't wait to see it again.
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The craft is excellent, Berg does a good job with the action, although it all seems so polished that it is impersonal. The schematism in the world vision can be carried away, you can feel how much the screenwriter tried to plastically see the problem. Not that it is completely successful - the overall message in the style of "we all have families and we love them, so we are just people" is pleasantly dulled by the final point. I don't know if the creators wanted to suppress that cleverly cynical message at the last minute, and I really didn't understand the choice of music. Given the acting and the really frenetic and swollen last twenty minutes, The Kingdom will definitely pay off... A mastered genre film, but Peter Berg still lacks considerable dose of individuality to achieve the brilliance of Mann or Scott.
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