Out of Frame: Rendition
Jake Gyllenhaal was frequently quoted this week when, in an interview, he declared that he "Hates preachy message films." No one's going to think twice about something like that coming from Dwane "The Rock" Johnson, but from someone doing press junkets for a film raising awareness about a U.S. government practice it clearly finds abominable, it's bound to elicit a ringing chorus of, "Say What?!?!?". Rendition is a movie so focused on its message that it forgets to actually tell a compelling or believable story to reach that end.
Make no mistake, raising awareness of the practice of extraordinary rendition is a worthy cause. The practice, which the CIA was given license to use under Clinton, involves the handing over of criminal suspects to foreign governments without any sort of due process, or any legal involvement at all, for that matter. In the wake of September 11th, the practice was increasingly applied to terror suspects, and critics maintain that the motivation is largely to transfer these suspects to nations with no qualms about using torture as an interrogation method. Assuming the allegations are true (the administration has repeatedly denied this as the aim of the practice), only the staunchest advocates of combating terrorism "by any means necessary" would approve.
In Gavin Hood's first film since 2005's Academy Award winning South African drama Tsotsi, he takes dead aim at extraordinary rendition, the CIA, and all those in Congress who look the other way for fear of appearing soft on terror. And by that measure, he scores a direct hit. As far as making a compelling film, though, he is way off the mark. To be fair, the film does have a great deal going for it. Anwar El-Ibrahimi (Omar Metwally), an Egyptian immigrant and chemist living in suburban bliss with his wife Isabella (Reese Witherspoon), his young son, and his mother, is kidnapped by the CIA and whisked away to an unspecified North African nation after a suicide bomber there kills a number of people in a public square, including the head of a CIA operations team stationed there. Running parallel to this is a story about a young girl escaping her father's tyrannical traditionalism and her forbidden relationship with a young man; this story's connection to the rest of the narrative is tenuous and unclear for much of the film. The setup is tense and thrilling, and Hood's direction gives the first 20 minutes a gripping pace and a dark, foreboding tone.
Things go downhill from there. CIA Analyst Douglas Freeman (Gyllenhaal) is assigned to spearhead the investigation of the incident, including observing the "interrogation" of El-Ibrahimi. The only explanation given as to why an analyst who spends most of his time in front of a computer screen is suddenly given a job completely outside his "scope" is that the CIA is "shorthanded." It's the first of a series of CIA blunders in the film that are so fantastical that they can really only be chalked up to the filmmaker's sincere hope that the agency really is as incompetent as it's portrayed.
Back home, Isabella enlists the assistance of an old flame played by Peter Sarsgaard, who, as luck would have it, is a staffer for Isabella's senator. Sarsgaard's character throws his security clearance to the wind, acting as an advocate for Isabella, determining what has become of her husband and attempting to persuade his crusty old boss (a sadly one-dimensional turn by Alan Arkin) to take up her cause with the CIA's director of counter-terrorism, played by Meryl Streep with evil menace so ludicrously cartoonish that she might as well have glued a long moustache to her face to twirl around her finger.
Blame for this mess has to fall squarely on screenwriter Kelley Sane, for his sins are many. Jake Gyllenhaal is completely wasted in an underdrawn character whose defining characteristics are a hatred of torture, a burgeoning alcohol dependency problem, and his vaguely middle eastern girlfriend, who is clumsily inserted into the film as an unsubtle cue that Freeman (note the 6th grade symbolism of the name) is more enlightened than his compadres. The climax of the film hinges on a twist that is nakedly manipulative and utterly uncalled for. And the final scene of the film has a storybook happily-ever-after unbelievability that would have Walt Disney himself shaking his head and saying, "I just don't buy it." Only Sarsgaard's character manages depth beyond that of a kiddie pool, and is the only one to face any real personal conflict; of course, the script dumps him unceremoniously from the storyline when he's reached the limit of his usefulness.
Hood saves what he can from the mess of a screenplay. In fact, it's only in the quiet moments between lines that the movie truly shines, as the director wrenches a few moments of genuine emotion from the improbable melodrama. Rendition is the sort of film, like Crash, designed to make otherwise well-intentioned liberal minds feel like they've just witnessed a powerful experience. The reality of this film is that it's nothing but a shallow and underdeveloped position paper. Its message might speak to the choir, and may even raise awareness. And that may be a good thing. But good filmmaking? Hardly.
Rendition opens Friday at a number of theaters throughtout the area.