Review of The Kingdom (1994) by Tamye F — 16 Jan 2012

Directed by Peter Berg, (Very Bad Things (1998), Friday Night Lights (2004) and Hancock (2008)), this is a thought-provoking and suspenseful action thriller, set in a foreign country where human rights are non-existant, and they have a very different way of dealing with crime.

It should make viewers think twice before going there. In the American compound of Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, where there's oil being drilled, al-Qaeda set off a bomb and go on a shooting spree. FBI Special Agent Francis Manner (Kyle Chandler), who is based out there, calls his colleague Agent Ronald Fleury (Jamie Foxx) to send a team out there to investigate, including Agent Grant Sykes (Chris Cooper), Agent Janet Mayes (Jennifer Garner) and analyst Adam Leavitt (Jason Bateman) are given 5 days to investigate in this difficult and unforgiving land.

They're placed under the care of Colonel Faris al-Ghazi (Ashraf Barhom), but the FBI are only there to observe and advise with the Saudi's investigation, and their permissions to help are denied, even though they find several leads to who might be responsible for the bombing.

It's a rare beast of a film, an action film with brains, intelligent enough even for the masses. It has good moments of action, it's very tense at certain points too, and it's a good look at a world we seldom see.