Here we have Stone hitting the first home runs, finding his strength as a gonzo film maker. Using the extremely bloody civil war in El Salvador as a back drop, this semi-biographical film (so I've heard) can be a stand in for so many brutal wars: Vietnam, Cambodia, East Timor, Guautemala, Chile, more....take your pick. The wars in Central and South America are particularly brutal affairs and are fairly well documented. As an American I'm quite sure Stone was outraged to see the US complicity in the spiraling murderous storms that over-took so many countries that they had vested interests in. For those of us old enough to remember, the Iran-Contra scandal (although involving sordid US affairs in Nicaragua) also spills its poison into places like El Savador. In short: it is a clearly known fact (see: Peter Dale Scott, read and weep) that the US helped prop up, set up and maintain the darkest, most vile police state regimes in almost every single Central American country and was totally duplicitous in the downfall of democratically elected President Allende of Chile. The CIA and US Army personnel have blood on their hands and this movie only just touches on the depth of their guilt. Sure, it was local gangsters and mobs doing the killing, setting up death squads; it was with tacit US support if only because they chose to look the other way. That then President Regan stepped up this process which only resulted in tearing the fabric out of so many countries, sending already poor countries into a living hell, makes me very wary of those who pine for or think that things were so much better under Regan's domain. Ask the poor of Central America and Regan and his cronies are held in total contempt.
This movie is hard to watch in several ways. The scenes of mass killings are gut wrenching. Scenes of torture and random rape of nurses, nuns, missionaries is horrifying. The cold blooded murder of Archbishop Oscar Arnulfo Romero is crushing (see: Romero, a phenomenal film with the late Raul Julia)....after Romero gives a fiercely impassioned speech to his flock, raging away at the mounting brutality...he is murdered....
There is so much violence to talk about that I need to speak a bit about other matters. James Woods gives the performance of his career. He is simply outstanding. Belushi really surprised me and was an excellent foil to Wood's character. The wild and very raw camera movements and cinematography just added layers of roughness to scenes of violence and chaos. This is not a pretty film and it keeps us on edge, not allowing us to think for a moment that there are any redeeming moments. Without spoiling the end of the film, the bitterness of this films message goes right to the closing seconds without let up.
Stone uses a sledge hammer to talk about journalists putting themselves in deaths door and there is ambivalence here. Wood's character is a sleaze-ball but at the end he begins a late in life process of soul rehabilitation. There are other journalists here who are junkies in the best tradition....to the super rush of fear as they photograph total chaos and murder, getting close to the ultimate bit of revelation that they too are often destroyed in the process. It is not a glamorous life but one filled with various and often conflicted personal agendas. Stone is again contemptuous of political apparatchiks and their often inept tour of duty. One comes away from watching this film thinking that Stone feels very little good about the way his country's foreign policy has been executed. With all those dead bodies in so many wars, is it any wonder? Very violent and as rough in the gut as they come. As close to the way it was; it should make you feel sick.
This movie is hard to watch in several ways. The scenes of mass killings are gut wrenching. Scenes of torture and random rape of nurses, nuns, missionaries is horrifying. The cold blooded murder of Archbishop Oscar Arnulfo Romero is crushing (see: Romero, a phenomenal film with the late Raul Julia)....after Romero gives a fiercely impassioned speech to his flock, raging away at the mounting brutality...he is murdered....
There is so much violence to talk about that I need to speak a bit about other matters. James Woods gives the performance of his career. He is simply outstanding. Belushi really surprised me and was an excellent foil to Wood's character. The wild and very raw camera movements and cinematography just added layers of roughness to scenes of violence and chaos. This is not a pretty film and it keeps us on edge, not allowing us to think for a moment that there are any redeeming moments. Without spoiling the end of the film, the bitterness of this films message goes right to the closing seconds without let up.
Stone uses a sledge hammer to talk about journalists putting themselves in deaths door and there is ambivalence here. Wood's character is a sleaze-ball but at the end he begins a late in life process of soul rehabilitation. There are other journalists here who are junkies in the best tradition....to the super rush of fear as they photograph total chaos and murder, getting close to the ultimate bit of revelation that they too are often destroyed in the process. It is not a glamorous life but one filled with various and often conflicted personal agendas. Stone is again contemptuous of political apparatchiks and their often inept tour of duty. One comes away from watching this film thinking that Stone feels very little good about the way his country's foreign policy has been executed. With all those dead bodies in so many wars, is it any wonder? Very violent and as rough in the gut as they come. As close to the way it was; it should make you feel sick.