In the Valley of Elah

After sitting through the crap known as Crash, I never would have thought that I would ever like a movie directed by Paul Haggis. But color me surprised.

Even after many good reviews and the positive review from Josh, I was still a bit skeptical about seeing this movie. Sure there are a couple annoying Haggisisms in this movie (teaching the "ignorant" immigrant maintenance guy how to properly hang the American flag only to come back later to the same setting where the immigrant has now learned to respect the flag only to have a surprise in store for him) but they are minor transgressions. In fact, the final scene that I referred to in the previous sentence is actually pretty damn ballsy for a mainstream film. Did the studio really think a movie like this would make any money?

The film is based on a true story of a father of a soldier played by Tommy Lee Jones, a former military man himself, who begins to investigate the disappearance of his son shortly after his return from Iraq. Jones is on a roll these days. Every movie he is in, he is splendid. In fact, with a lesser actor this film might have been too full of Haggis crap. But Jones carries the film beautifully.

A sidenote about this film:
It is the second 2007 film that features both Jones and Josh Brolin which is interesting to me in and of itself. But the more interesting aspect of this is that in both films (this and No Country for Old Men) neither actor ever appears together on screen. I'm not sure why I find that so interesting but I do. I really really do.

Directed by Paul Haggis
2007
DVD