Review of In the Valley of Elah (2007) by Graham P — 27 Dec 2008

I was fairly underwhelmed by this drama from the director of 2005s Crash, despite the fact that it contains some excellent performances and seems to be a realistic and well-researched movie based on real-life events that occured in 2004. Tommy Lee Jones puts in a strong performance as Hank Deerfield; a father whose son - a soldier in the US military - dissappears after a tour in Iraq. The young soldier's burnt and dismembered body is found shortly thereafter, and together with a detective (the ever dependable Charlize Theron) Hank atttempts to get to the truth behind his son's untimely demise.

The pair embark on an investigation that sees them coming into conflict with the US military's own investigatory team - who want to whitewash the whole incident as best they can. Hank manages to talk to the other soldiers from his son's squad, and also views footage that he took on his mobile phone whilst serving in Iraq and attempts to piece together the facts that surround his death, whilst trying to come to terms and make sense of events that seem to be completely senseless.

Part of the problem with this film is that the screenplay takes a rather slow and monotonous route to reach a rather uninspired and not particularly surprising conclusion. Certainly we have strong performances and these help create an atmosphere of authenticity that help us accept the proceedings as a more factual tale; but at the same time it is not really a very interesting one, and I found the finale to be massively dissappointing. The overall tone is clearly anti-war, with the idea that conflict turns good people into killers and torturers being reinforced by the digital footage we see on Hank's laptop; taken by his son. Unfortunately, this sentiment is not enough to turn this into a particularly intelligent or involving movie and certainly there is absolutely nothing that will surprise you in the way the story pans out. As I previously stated, this film is underwhelming.