Syriana

"Syriana" was written and directed by Stephen Gaghan. It stars George Clooney and Matt Damon. Clooney was also one of the producers.

If you're planning to watch "Syriana," my advice is, "Don't blink." As one reviewer commented, this movie is like a two-hour version of a six-hour television miniseries.

The film narrates a complex web of interrelated events involving the CIA, Texas oil gazillionaires, the familial conflicts within Arab oil sheikhdoms, dissipated Iranian weapons brokers, turncoat Levantine terrorists, corrupted corporate and government attorneys, layed-off migrant oilfield roughnecks seduced by Wahabbism, the counterfeit justice of the U.S. Justice Department, and an energy/financial consultant driven by personal tragedy. Almost needless to say, it's a Byzantine and convoluted mix which demands a viewer's full attention.

Now that "Syriana" has finally been released on DVD (on June 20), cinephiles will be armed with an advantage not afforded by theatre viewing: you can rewind and re-watch scenes as many times as needed to keep the story straight. Even then, this movie assumes intelligent and dedicated viewers, and will elude the ill-informed and unsophisticated. For that, it deserves five stars.

However, the film's strength is also its weakness. Except for Clooney's character, the CIA agent and old middle east hand Bob Barnes, there is almost no character development. "Syriana" is so intricately plotted and so concentrated on unspooling the narrative that the players are reduced to their politico-economic roles in the story line. Only Clooney/Barnes has enough on-screen time to develop anything resembling ambiguity, or internal conflict.

As the story opens, Barnes is desperate to find a rocket launcher after it is stolen during one of his covert weapons-selling stings in Tehran.

"Syriana's" second intertwined element involves the merger of two corrupt Texas oil companies, one of them headed by a braying jackass skilfully rendered by Chris Cooper, and the payoffs, browbeating and looking the other way that allows the deal to subvert antitrust regulations. That process is facilitated by young, ambitious attorney Bennett Holiday (Jeffrey Wright), who smooths the path for Justice Department approval of the deal.

Meanwhile, a smooth-talking energy analyst/oil broker, Bryan Woodman (Matt Damon), after suffering a family tragedy manages to harness his grief-generated energy into a blockbuster deal with a Persian Gulf prince (Alexander Siddig), who vows to end his country's long history of American petroleum exploitation and bring its economy out of a chronic depression. What these two don't know is that the U.S. oil companies, operating on the advice of their own Rasputin, a high-powered lawyer masterfully brought to life by Christopher Plummer, plan to undermine the prince's claim to the throne and force his father, the Emir, to name the prince's shallow, frivolous, vain, and pliable younger brother as his successor.

While all this is going on, layed-off Pakistani oil field workers in the Emir's kingdom on temporary visas are recruited by Muslim extremists operating a Madrassa and turned into suicide bombers who end the movie with a bang, connecting the story's conclusion with its opening and tying up the plot's loose ends.

Got enough on your plate yet?

As an exposition of the complexity of political, economic, social, and ethical reality I would rate "Syriana" very highly. The problem is, that kind of reality is too complex to reproduce in a two-hour film. So as a drama I have to say it's only partially successful, but it still gets four stars. This movie is highly recommended.

P.S. There's no end to this movie's subtleties. The name "Syriana" is an obscure geographic term referring to the trans-Mediterranean region occupied by the countries of Syria, Lebanon, Israel, Palestine, and Jordan. It's the same area sometimes called the Levant.