Brussels
April 26, 2011
Good movie: Route Irish
Back to work! Almost a relief after the hectic three days I had as a tourist. Tourism, at least the way I do it, is very tiring. But, as David Letterman says, it’s a good kind of tired.
Today started a battery of classes. It was fun to get back into the classroom after doing mostly support for many weeks.
Took care of the Attend a Movie requirement for Brussels tonight. I was running out of hope – everything in Brussels was either not in English, or I’d already seen it, or I’d rather drive upholstery tacks into my gums than see it. Then I spied a new Ken Loach film with the curious name Route Irish playing at a multiplex in the center of town. Score.
I recommend the film. I have no idea if it’s even opened in the states, or if it will open. Ken Loach has never done big business there. He’s an angry, frankly political filmmaker. Compared to Ken Loach’s films, Mike Leigh’s movies are Spielberg.
This one treads similar ground to the much less successful Green Zone with Matt Damon from a year or two. In fact, the color in the title relates to the title of the Loach film. “Route Irish, ” according to the movie, is a nickname Americans give to the stretch of road in Baghdad which connects The Green Zone to the airport. It’s considered the most dangerous stretch of road in the world.
Mark Womack stars as a Liverpudlian ex-military, ex-mercenary who hears of his best friend’s death on Route Irish. At the funeral, .listening to the fulsome speeches and condolences from the suits of the Blackwater-like organization that his friend worked for, Womack begins to get suspicious. He begins tugging at threads and soon the cover story about his friend’s death begins to unravel.
I really liked the movie because I like anything that deals with complex moral ambiguity. By the end of the film, there’s no one who’s really innocent. I also must say that, while I’m generally a complete wuss when it comes to depictions of torture on screen (or in fiction, for that matter), it’s used in an extremely smart and nuanced way in this movie. I don’t want to say more, but let’s just say it made the stakes in the movie even more morally messy. Which is a good thing.
Seek Route Irish out if you are up for a gritty, sad, beautifully acted drama about the moral complexities of modern war.
Got home just in time to download the huge new Patch 4.1 for World of Warcraft. OMG tons of new stuff to do!
Some Good Movies About the Slippery Morals of War
- Under Fire
- Salvador
- Route Irish
- Three Days of the Condor
- Syriana
- Gallipoli
- Breaker Morant
- Paths of Glory
- Black Book
