May 20th, 2025

There have been a few attempts of what one could call the Platoon of The Iraq War. Hurt Locker is almost certainly the best one we’ve seen, but the fare since has been less laser focused, and ocassionally went down closer to propaganda (*cough cough* American Sniper *cough cough*) than anything artistic.

But while filming his journalistic epic Civil War, Alex Garland became friends with Marine Veteran and Stunt Coordinator Ray Mendoza, who explained to Garland what he and his platoon went through in 2006 Iraq. What comes about is a movie “based on memories” that shows the stress inducing realities of war in real time. Every minute on screen is a minute you’re sitting in the audience and that move makes each second of the bloodshed all the more gripping.

The film is light on details, you have the knowledge that any character receives in any minute the movie is playing out in front of you. These soldiers are trying to hold their ground in a “friendly” (or at least not completely unfriendly) Iraqi household, moving into the apartment under the cover of night. The first thirty minutes tick by slowly, as the platoon does recon, attempting to spy on suspected terrorist threats in the city. As they wait and watch, without any warning a grenade is casually slipped thru a hole in the side of the apartment.

Injuries pile up and the crew regroups, one of them is injured, but not in any immediately life threatening kind of way. Tensions rise as they try to navigate the apartment while staying away from the windows and doors, attempting to get a tank to pick up their wounded comrade. The tension is made all the more real as the sound design of gunfire and explosions go off around you in the theater, knowing that every second you watch is a second for a bullet to sink into one of the soldiers.

It’s gripping cinema, both in terms of performance from the cast, and effect design and camera work from the directing team of Garland and Mendoza. The smartest move the director duo does in my book is towards the end, right before the credits roll as the marines make their retreat and the family of Iraqi citizens come out to see their home. Blood is everywhere, bullet holes riddle the walls, explosions have gone off along the roofs of the area, destroying balconies and shaking inhospitable dust throughout. They look around at the devastation the American forces have wrought in horror, and as they do the forces that the Americans were supposed to have fought back just slowly approach. It begs you to ask not only “What was the point of all of this?” and “What were these boys even doing here?” but also “Are we even the good guys of this story?”

There is some degree of USO show energy as the credits roll. It shows some of the real marines visiting the set of the film, which is good, and I’m glad happened. But the move to put that with the credits undercuts the ending of the actual movie, pulling you out of the film in an abrupt fashion. Warfare isn’t perfect, but it’s a way to see what one platoon went through in a misguided war that we never should have been in.

4/5