Review of Unthinkable (2007) by Angel T — 04 Nov 2010

The only reason I watched this was because my dad borrowed it (he likes renting lots of action flicks for the weekend), and it's kind of funny how I got much more out of it than my dad did. this movie is very intense (though kinda unintentionally funny too, in the way that some of the characters are SUPER CLICHE DRAMA KINGS), it has torture (of the SHIELD YOUR CHILDREN'S EYES way) and lots of discussion on wartime morality.

the woman is the embodiment of wartime empathy and sympathy, she's the one who has to step up and stop the men from doing things that make them monsters. the torturer asks the tough questions, but does as he's told, he's the anthropomorphized weapon that gets out of control.

I liked the ambiguity the ending presented, is being "humane" worth it if you get thousands of people killed? is doing the unthinkable worth it, even if you save so many more lives? this may be because I study media theory and develop the habit to look at the deeper semantics behind every media text, but I was kind of disappointed the movie's message didn't seem to have sunk in for my dad (he just enjoys action thrillers).

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