Review of No End in Sight (2007) by Rick A — 14 Jan 2008

An in-depth look at the development of the Iraq War. It's mostly just talking heads and archival footage, so it's nothing fresh or amazing from a filmmaking standpoint. But it rises above the all the typical Michael Moore-style propaganda documentaries by taking a really deep look at the events of the past few decades and getting the perspectives of the people who experienced them firsthand.

It's interesting to see how the only people who had any Middle East foreign policy experience and actually knew how to handle the situation have always been ignored and left out of the decision-making process.

Instead, the war has been handled by a bunch of people who either have no idea what they're doing or seem like they're intentionally trying to screw up Iraq as badly as possible. The result: water and electricity are hard to come by, looting and the destruction of national monuments are left unchecked, the Iraqi military gets disbanded, thousands of people are barred from any kind of employment for no real reason, more and more people turn to religious fanaticism, terrorism and general crime rise dramatically, hundreds of thousands of people die, and the United States will spend over a trillion dollars by the time everything is said and done.

It's fascinating, but it's also completely fucking depressing.