Review of Restrepo (2010) by Nick O — 02 Jan 2011

I've always found it hard to judge a documentary on its people, and not the topic it handles. That, and I can't so much as call the soldiers of "Restrepo" "characters" per se; they're real people it'd be stupid to even try and say you've figured out. I can't imagine the amount of turmoil these guys go through both in and out of the Afghanistan valley they've been seemingly forever rooted in. Second Platoon has named the output station in the valley after a fallen soldier, Juan 'Doc' Restrepo.

"Restrepo" made me feel, all at once, angry, sad and, by the end, incredibly thankful. Tim Hetherington and Sebastian Junger's film barely gets to the heart of our War on Terror, but it is in no way politically biased. The looks on these soldiers' faces are what completely personify "Restrepo". The disheartening and often sickening vibes of the movie hit home here in America, as we ignorantly keep pushing soldiers into a no man's land with the wave of a hand and stroke of a pen.

The heroes of "Restrepo" make their positions appear eerily natural, and Hetherington and Junger's movie shows how on the drop of a hat the crew's bi-polar nature can all at once jump from savory to macabre to damn straight hysterical, as the situated mood of a massive group can only prepare the psyche of a single human life.