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04/23/09
The Situation (2007)
37
%
Tomatometer
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Reviews Counted:46
Fresh:17
Rotten:29
Average Rating:5/10
Consensus: An ambitious but preachy drama that fails to convincingly parcel its thriller and romance elements.
Runtime: 1 hr 46 mins
Genre: Dramas
Synopsis: Shooting a fictional movie based on a real war while that war still rages is a risky proposition. But director Philip Haas (THE MUSIC OF CHANCE) has taken the plunge with THE SITUATION, a film set... [More]
Starring: Damian Lewis, Connie Nielsen, John Slattery, Peter Eyre
Director: Philip Haas
Reviews for The Situation
[Haas'] attempt to convey the tangled relations between sheikhs and insurgents, occupiers and civilians is undercut by Wendell Steavenson's mightily overwritten screenplay.
03/30/07
... an inevitably dated contemplation of the complexities of the American occupation of Iraq ...
01/25/07
His heart is in the right place, and our current situation cries out for a film like this %u2026 like this, but much better made.
02/11/07
Awkward and half-digested.
01/30/07
It's [Wendell Steavenson] first screenplay, and it shows; while not the movie's only problem, the script is a big one, made up as it is primarily of dialogue that isn't just expository, but clunkily explanatory.
02/09/07
I don't think this movie sheds any new light on 'the situation', but it could have, and it's a shame that it didn't.
07/09/07
The Situation is, to put it kindly, a spotty piece of work.
01/30/07
The film would have made a serviceable drama, perhaps, if [writer] Steavenson and [director] Haas weren't so inured to trite utterances.
02/08/07
There are a half dozen people in colorful supporting roles all of whom have their own truths. And all of whom are far more interesting, as characters and actors, than [Connie Nielsen].
03/08/07
As ambitious in scope as it is interpretively timid, The Situation delivers the requisite incendiary climax, but collapses in on itself with daft speeches about the elusiveness of truth in something called 'the fourth dimension of time.'
02/08/07
Though timely and relevant, Haas' war film, centering on American journalist (Connie Nielsen) investigating the death of a community figure, is a series of misfires (particularly the script) and blown opportunities
01/17/07
Had traces of human feeling, but [it's] mostly didactic.
01/02/07
A pretty lousy movie in general, though it's the film's somewhat accusatory Iraq War subject matter that's getting it some attention -- deserved or not -- that makes the whole thing a little distasteful.
04/27/07
The situation in The Situation is grimly photogenic, yet persistently opaque.
02/02/07
Having served my duty by pointing out the main failures of the film, it's equally obligatory to say that by film's end you have a better understanding of the opposing interests that are deconstructing Iraq than media coverage conveys.
01/13/07
The Situation is promoting itself as the first American dramatic feature film to deal with the occupation of Iraq. While that may be true, it turns out not to matter that much.
02/08/07
Top CriticThe Situation never fails to be illustrative, like in straight reporting, but at the expense of catharsis.
02/02/07
The narrative has no direction. There is no central problem to be resolved, no goal to be reached.
02/02/07
It fails to strike an emotional chord, however, with a meandering narrative and heroes who spout rhetoric like pundits.
02/07/07
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