In 2003, in Baghdad, Chief Warrant Officer Roy Miller (Matt Damon) leads a U.S. Army squad into suspected Iraqi WMD sites, except all the sites they investigate hide no WMD. He suspects faulty or fictitious intelligence. His superiors, military and civilian, lead by Clark Poundstone (Greg Kinnear), representing the American government, deny Miller's assessment or don't care. Poundstone has his own agenda; Miller wants the truth. When an Iraqi civilian informs Miller of a meeting of high-ranking Iraqi Baathist Army officers nearby, Miller investigates, leading to the discovery of a monster truth which lots of big shots don't want made public. Frenetic action—as in director Greengrass's Bourne movies—sympathetic renditions of the Iraqis, and displaying the American government's cynical need for sustaining the WMD reason for the Iraq War, at almost any cost, Green Zone works as an action flick, an indictment of motives and means, and a battle of truth versus lies, and its companion, evil. Who are the good guys? What kind of bad guys are the 'bad guys'? Who are the bad guys? Who is after what? What's the power of information and misinformation? What justifies what actions and behavior? Green Zone is an action movie with a heart and intelligence. It presents a good story, quickly, and treats its audience intelligently. Sure it's an "Iraq War movie." It's also a movie about the Iraq War being another age-old battleground for truth, good, and what is, or what should be, the American Way.
Review of Green Zone
