Review of Fair Game (2010) by Cam B — 19 Apr 2011

A fascinating film that spends much of its time discrediting Bush, Cheney and the US Government's reasons for going to Iraq. As I occasionally do, I think it best to quote someone else in my response to it here - this time, it's Roger Ebert: "This topic has been so poisoned by misinformation that a rational discussion seems impossible. I suppose the question becomes, how well does "Fair Game" work as a movie? I suspect it will work better the more you walk in agreeing with it." I wonder how much accuracy is in that statement, as it could easily be a fair bit.

That being said, I reckon Penn - who can do no wrong according to we at House Bennett when it comes to filmmaking - would hope that, if nothing else, rational discussion can and should still be had about issues such as those brought up in the film. Mind you, some of the best scenes from the film show Watts and Penn's characters having mates over for dinner and political discussions breaking out...the content of which has been mostly informed by the US media. It's this beautiful irony that's inherent in the piece - and one that you feel the film's writers, makers and actors understand full well - that makes it so fascinating. For while they tell a pretty darn didactic story here, it's clear that they know they're just providing us with one representation of a story that none of us will ever truly understand. Really, really interesting.

As an aside, there's some really distracting hand-held camera use in the early stages...what's with the fad of that at the moment???