Syriana (9 December 2006)
directed by Stephen Gaghan
starring George Clooney, Matt Damon, Alexander Siddig, Christopher Plummer, Jeffrey Wright, Chris Cooper, Amanda Peet, Steven Hinkle, Amr Waked, Kayvan Novak, Akbar Kurtha, Roger Yuan, Jamey Sheridan, Tim Blake Nelson, William Hurt, Mark Strong, Jayne Atkinson
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MPAA rating: Studio: Warner Brothers, Section Eight, Participant Productions Script: Stephen Gaghan Based on the book by: Robert Baer Music: Alexandre Desplat Running time: 126 minutes Tags: assassination; Beruit; CIA; deserts; Drama; explosions; Lebanon; murder; oil; terrorism; Thriller; torture Tactical strength: [6/10]
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for violence and language
For the first hour, director Stephen Gaghan tries to keep the audience confused about exactly what's happening in Syriana. Gaghan makes the mistake that "confusion" implies "complexity." While viewer confusion can sometimes work effectively in a film, usually confusion indicates an error in either the writer or director's judgment about how construct the film. In this case where Gaghan both wrote and directed the film, I think he must take all the blame. As the film progresses, you see all the pieces come together, and Syriana really doesn't have too much complexity.
A major oil company, Connex has just gained rights to oil in Kazakhstan through an announced merger but has lost a big contract in the Middle East to China. Connex hires a big-guns law firm to help push the merger through, since more oil really serves the American interests. With that same economic understanding, the CIA works to get the Arabs to invalidate the Chinese contracts and return the contracts to an American firm -- and the CIA doesn't always play nice. A third, minor plot shows how immigrant Pakistani workers in a Gulf state lose their jobs in the oil industry and turn into fundamentalist suicide bombers.
Syriana wants to make a political statement that oil is dirty, and no one connected with the oil industry can stay clean. The game doesn't have any rules, and the only way to measure success comes from looking at who gets the oil and who gets the money. If you watch the commentary on the DVD, you hear from just about every character that they wanted Syriana to send a message about oil. Some, like George Clooney, just wanted us to take a deeper look at where our oil comes from. Others, like director Gaghan, want you to feel just as dirty as the corrupt characters in the film for using petroleum products. In spite of good performances by an amazing cast, the preachy message of Syriana turned me off.
I don't understand George Clooney winning the Academy Award for Best supporting actor for his role as Bob the CIA agent. I think Clooney does excellent work, and personally I thought he should have won as best director for Good Night, and Good Luck. I don't understand why the academy considered him a supporting actor when he has the biggest role in the film. Maybe the award for his role as Bob makes up for his not even receiving nominations for many other roles.
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