Meeting Resistance (2007/First Run Features DVD)
Picture:
C+ Sound: C+ Extras: D Documentary: D
Although
I am certain the U.S. had made mistakes in Iraq with all the games, lack of
leadership, no-bid contracts, making obscene business deals and literally
building malls for long-term stays in the country by the Bush II administration
out of control, but even with all that, I found the Steve Connors/Molly Bingham
documentary more of a sloppy, manipulative propaganda film than anything else.
With text
notes all over the place, translations I am suspicious of, agit-prop editing
that makes U.S. troops look like predators and other questionable shots and
cuts that anyone with half a brain would question, the outside of the case asks
would you the U.S. viewer like it if your country was occupied. Instead of presenting a piece about a U.S.
invasion, it talks about and portrays the U.S. in Iraq as all bad, all evil and
interviews masked people about how they banded together to fight the
“Americans” because they were there to do only bad things.
Despite
the Bush II mistakes and purposely bad decisions, to portray things as overly
simple on a five-year-old level and then never mention that Saddam Hussein was
a sadistic dictator is bad enough. To
then forget about the long history of the region and act like the U.S. was
never there before, only going there to ‘kill and pillage’ is insane,
indefensible and a disaster. If the
intent was a retro-Battleship Potemkin
or just anti-American (not just anti-Bush II) propaganda, the makers succeeded.
Don’t be
fooled!!!
The 1.33
X 1 image is not bad for recent analog video edited together, while the Dolby
Digital 2.0 is barely stereo. Extras
include film notes, the original trailer and co-directors’ commentary that
never worked for me. The argument that
Iraqis are “never show” or “shown as human” followed by propaganda is a dirty
trick as we see them as human all the time, this is illicit appeal to pity and
I did not even believe the stories they were telling on the commentary on how
this all came together.
Something
is very wrong here.
- Nicholas Sheffo
