'Green Zone': Preview

The Green Zone is the latest film by director Paul Greengrass. It is based on the award winning book Imperial Life in the Emerald City, which is a fantastic story which examines the environment of US-occupied Iraq.

The movie is set in the early stages of the Iraq war in 2003, a time where no one could be trusted and everyone was a suspect. Every decision made by the US occupying forces in Iraq could detonate unforeseen consequences. During the US led invasion of Iraq in 2003 Chief Warrant Officer Rory Miller (Damon) and his team of army inspectors are dispatched to find weapons of mass destruction that are believed to be somewhere in the Iraqi desert. Along the way are a series of traps and ambushes that make the mission highly dangerous. The men search for deadly chemical weapons but instead stumble upon an elaborate cover-up that inverts the entire purpose of the mission.

Spun by operatives with hidden agendas, Miller must hunt through covert and inaccurate intelligence on foreign soil that will either clear a ruthless regime or escalate a war in an already unstable Middle East region. Miller will have to search in this unforgiving place for the most elusive weapon of all, the truth. Greengrass said of the film:

"I don't really start with a story; I start with the area I want to be in," says Greengrass, explaining the movie's genesis. "It was summer 2004, and I was thinking about 9/11 on the one hand and the war in Iraq, which was less than a year old, on the other. Those twin events are what are driving our politics and our culture, and that was the headwind that was making the Bourne films lift. So I wanted to make a film about the real world that was begetting those Bourne feelings, a film that basically asks that audience to step behind that curtain."

Greengrass' style is definitely visible from the trailer, fast paced action sequences jumping from one scene and location to the next, shaky off centre camera work that leaves you feeling like you have been tipped upside down repeatedly, and of course every scene involving Matt Damon and violence is accompanied by thumping heart pounding drumming.

This is the style that made the Bourne trilogy so watchable and enjoyable, some movies move at a snail's pace giving you time to take a trip to the toilet or even make a quick cup of coffee but not in the Bourne movies and seemingly not in the Green Zone. Miss five minutes of a Bourne film and you have probably missed multiple location changes and several highly watchable action sequences. Some have labelled this film as 'Bourne goes to Iraq' and maybe rightly so, but what is wrong with that if the film is half as entertaining and heart pounding as the Bourne trilogy?

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