Quick Reviews

The American - 3.0 - This wonderfully shot film at first seemed intriguing with its ominous air of mystery, but as the pace slowed to a crawl, I was more or less bored out of my mind.  Even George Clooney's natural charisma was neutralized by the tedious pacing; the first 80 minutes of the film literally revolved around his character building a gun.  I was actually quite impressed someone could make a movie about assassins and prostitutes this boring.

The Quiet American - 6.0 - I'm pretty sure the George Clooney feature discussed above would've gone for this title if it wasn't already taken (The Dull American or The Bored American would've worked as well).  Anyways, I 75% watched this one with the family (it's always a much too difficult/protracted task choosing a movie to watch on netflix, admittedly primarily due to my pickiness) and thought it was a moderately interesting story, elevated by a captivating performance by Michael Caine.

Restrepo - 7.0 - Restrepo is a recently Oscar nominated documentary about the war in Afghanistan.  Documentaries are always hard for me to rate since a big part of my scale loosely involves entertainment/rewatchability, and I can't think of a single documentary that I'd ever want to watch a second time (Jeremy swears by Hoop Dreams but I only saw it once a long, long time ago).  Anyways, Restrepo sacrifices structure and character development and instead just throws the viewer in with a battalion of soldiers (I think it was a battalion, maybe a squad... not like I have any idea what the difference is either way).  This is a very effective way of providing (what I would assume to be) a realistic depiction of what it's like to serve in Afghanistan; i.e. it sucks.  Like a lot of war movies, it also forced me to consider that uneasy balance between appreciating soldiers for doing things I would never in a million years want to do and acknowledging that I, a (liberal, bleeding heart) civilian, can never understand what it's like to go through what they go through, while also being slightly uncomfortable (if not disturbed) by some of their actions (like the general glorification of violence -- cheering when you kill people, etc).  I think I'll just say I'm glad it's not me and I'll refrain from judging a soldier except for the most egregious offenses, and leave it at that.