DesertFox
12-02-2007, 11:13 AM
Americans may be divided on many subjects but they seem to agree on one thing: they will not buy tickets to see this year's crop of war films. Rarely have film critics and moviegoers, conservatives and liberals, been in such agreement - the big-screen lecturing that underscores Hollywood's approach to Iraq war-related films has rendered this crop of multimillion-dollar movies with top-star casts a critical and financial flop.
Oscar-winning director Paul Haggis's In the Valley of Elah, about a father investigating the death of his son in Iraq, has taken just $6.5m in two months; the political drama Lambs for Lions starring Tom Cruise and Meryl Streep, and directed by Robert Redford, has been called 'the most inert, predictable and unnecessary political film this year'; Rendition, starring Reese Witherspoon and Jake Gyllenhaal, a $50m thriller, has taken less than $10m since it was released in October.
Even films that are not war-themed but touch on Middle East issues have suffered.
More (http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,,2220442,00.html)
Oscar-winning director Paul Haggis's In the Valley of Elah, about a father investigating the death of his son in Iraq, has taken just $6.5m in two months; the political drama Lambs for Lions starring Tom Cruise and Meryl Streep, and directed by Robert Redford, has been called 'the most inert, predictable and unnecessary political film this year'; Rendition, starring Reese Witherspoon and Jake Gyllenhaal, a $50m thriller, has taken less than $10m since it was released in October.
Even films that are not war-themed but touch on Middle East issues have suffered.
More (http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,,2220442,00.html)