Ever since 9/11, and the Bush administration's questionable over-reaction to that tragic event, fictional media has been examining morality when it comes to terrorism. From The Dark Knight to Watchmen to 24, the question that is constantly being raised is, "How immoral can a Government or a Lawman be, in order to protect the greater good?".
That question is again asked in Unthinkable, which takes a scenario right out of 24, and distills it down to a basic, three character, single location screenplay. The U.S Government receive a terrorist video claiming that three nuclear bombs will be detonated in separate major American cities by the end of the week, unless his demands are met. The U.S. born terrorist, Michael Sheen, is caught, and brought to a secret location for interrogation. The head of the F.B.I.'s Counter Terrorist Unit, Carrie Anne Moss, is brought in to locate the nukes, while mysterious torturer-for-hire, Samuel L Jackson, is drafted to forcefully extract the information from the extremist.
This is small scale stuff, that's perhaps best suited for TV, as it's essentially a stage play put to film. The direction is unremarkable, but it's obviously a powerful, topical script that's managed to draw, not only the three leads, but cool character actors like Stephen Root, Gil Bellows, Brandon Routh and Holmes Osbourne. And it's a good, tense yarn with a simple, ticking-bomb premise; will Sam get Michael to spill the beans before the bombs go off? And what are the Law Officers, Army, Politicians and Torturer prepared to do, in order to save the day (and they're willing to push it to the limits, that's for sure)?
An intriguing story with great performances that's a little too uncinematic to be classed as a great film...but still very worthy. And the sad thing is, this discussion obviously takes place, in Governments, around the world all the time.
No comments:
Post a Comment