|
No End In Sight
Directed by: Charles Ferguson
Starring: Campbell Scott (Narrator)
Genre:
Documentary
Run Time: 102
min.
Release Date:
January 2007
On The Web:
Official
Site
Teaser:
Movie Trailer
Reviewed by
Byron Merritt |
I’ve often complained about
the one-sidedness of various documentaries. I appreciate the fact that
they’re trying to stress a point, but it’s nice to see the other side so
that I can best judge for myself. Barring that, I at least want to
see an attempt made at getting the other side; perhaps a journalist
chasing after someone who doesn’t want to talk about whatever subject is
being focused upon.
Which brings me to NO END IN SIGHT. Anyone with any wits about
them knows that we’re involved in a war that is heading straight into
the crapper. The U.S. has spent billions upon billions of dollars and
lost thousands of armed forces personnel for a cause that is often quite
unclear. Are we there for the U.S.’s best interests? For the oil? For
the world? Muddied is an adequate descriptor.
What No End In Sight does is show us, precisely, how we got where
we are today. And director Charles Ferguson pulls out all the stops,
trying, succeeding, and sometimes failing to get the higher-ups of the
higher-ups on video, explaining what went wrong. No one is left out.
Whether its archived footage or direct interviews, Ferguson puts it in
perfect perspective for all viewers.
From inappropriate foreign relations assignments by the Bush
Administration (they often sent over field personnel who had no foreign
relations experience and didn’t even speak Arabic), to failing to listen
to commanders on the ground, the entire restructuring of Iraq was doomed
from the start. Completely disbanding the Baathists and the Iraqi army
not only caused an extremely dangerous increase in unemployment, it also
aided those with no love for the U.S. in the first place to embrace
fundamentalism (see Roadside Bomb-Making 101).
It is to Mr. Ferguson’s credit that he tried to get politicos like
Condoleeza Rice, Colin Powell, George Tenet, Donald Rumsfeld, and Dick
Cheney to agree to interviews. When they refused, he put up on-screen
the words “[This person] refused to be interviewed for the film.” I like
that. I like it a lot. It shows that the director wasn’t afraid to get
the other side of the story, that he tried. And when he failed, he
wanted the audience to know it. It is also very telling that these
highest of higher-ups didn’t want to answer some very tough questions
surrounding their involvement in the early Iraq War.
What makes this documentary so great, though, is that it’s laid out in
uber-easy points, following one problem until it intertwined with
another, then another, then another, showing that not only is this “war”
a terrible injustice to the people of Iraq, but to the U.S. as well
since it’s our tax dollars that are funding such incompetence.
(back to top) |
Image from No End In Sight
DVD cost: $22.94
Purchase:
Barnes and Noble
Film Review Stew
Favorite? Yes.
Stew Poo-Poo? No.
Newsworthy:
Movie Quote: "We
watched our careful planning be discarded."
Other Actors/Actresses
from No End In Sight
   |
