In the Valley of Elah

My wife and I managed to watch quite a few of the best picture, actor, etc. nominees this year, both before and after the Oscars. Overall, we felt that No Country... was superior to most of what we watched, even if the others were pretty good. Last night I watched my Unbox rental of Paul Haggis' In the Valley of Elah. While I wanted to see this film anyway, a post on this blog prompted me to step up my timetable for when I would watch it.

Wow.

Elah was a complex, realistic, engaging story about a father (Tommy Lee Jones) finding out his youngest son has gone AWOL from the Army after returning from a tour in Iraq. He determines to discover where his son has gone and soon learns of the son's death. He then rattles the cages of the local (Charlize Theron) and the military (Jason Patric) police to do more and to be more aggressive (and, frankly, better at their jobs) in finding out what happened to his son. Susan Sarandan has a small but powerful role as Jones' wife.

From beginning to end, this film was superior to most of the other films up for awards in the last Oscars. I simply do not understand why this film wasn't nominated in more categories than Best Actor for Jones. The script was sound and engaging, the cinematography was well-conceived and executed, the direction and editing were both tight and well-done. All of the performances, including a surprise from Wes Chatham as Cpl. Penning in a very naturalist performance, were spot-on and incredible.

My best guess is that, because the movie was labeled as an "Iraq-war movie" people shied away from seeing it. Yes, it has some themes from Iraq that play a part in the movie, and the war is discussed, but the movie is not primarily about the war. The war was used as a prop; Haggis could have chosen any military conflict for this prop. The war theme is used to state that there are people who go to war, who are trained in and experience circumstances that non-military people could never hope to fully understand, and who come back and cannot "turn off" those experiences or that training. The circumstance of war and conflict alter them and their perceptions fundamentally. I wonder if this film would have been better-received if Haggis had chosen a different conflict as the back story to this story.

In comparison, I found this story tighter and more complete/compelling than Michael Clayton. It is much more powerful and complex than Juno. It nearly rivals No Country for its thought-provoking story and direction. While I have not yet seen Atonement, from what I've read of that movie in reviews, it seems that Elah is more even and consistent in its direction and story telling (most reviewers have argued that Atonement loses focus when the story switches to the man going to war). I would argue that Sarandan's performance was close to the same quality of Tilda Swinton in Michael Clayton (who won the Best Supporting Oscar). Theron also gave a strong, natural performance.

This movie will not be for everyone. There are some violent images and some of the back story scenes of what went on in Iraq to cause the change in personality of the characters may prove disturbing to some. However, as a thoughtful, relevant, and involving story concerning the ongoing affects of war on those who fight, it is well worth a watch.