The Hurt Locker: Good film but not as good as some reviews, lacked a little depth for me.
Yeah, agreed, I thought it descended into cliche quite a lot - the sub-plot about the missing kid seemed to be there just to "Hollywoodise" it, give it "a story" it didn't really need. And the bit at the end where he goes home and can't settle was very seen-it all-before. You can just imagine the production meetings and talk about "character arcs". :roll:
I didn't even think it was as nerve-rackingly tense as some people claimed - you knew there was no way the main character would get blown up halfway through the film!
I did like the bit where they had the standoff with the sniper in the desert - it was fascinating, the idea of taking on an unknown opponent at a vast distance, almost invisible in the heat haze. But even there, the film made too much of the way the men were suffering and dehydrating in the heat; I don't think film can convey those feelings to people sitting in a nice air-conditioned cinema (not until the advent of
Heat-O-Vision!, anyway).
