Rendition [DVD]

A thriller that dances through its story

multiple plot lines drawn neatly together.

Good

After a terrorist bombing accidentally kills an American "Jackal" (CIA type hit man) in a (fictional) foreign "Arab" country, a botched investigation based on Echelon type mobile phone data tracking leads to a green card Egyptian. A person who has been living in the United States for years and who is married to a beautiful pregnant, with second child, American (Reese Witherspoon). The unfortunate Egyptian guy is apprehended when he is on his way home, flight-side, at the US airport where Reese is waiting for him at Arrivals. The US Regime then secretly "disappears him" ("Rendition") to the country where the incident had occurred, through the illegal CIA "extraordinary kidnap rendition program" for some Abu Ghraib style "enhanced interrogation", which means torture to normal people. A sensitive, educated, pen-pusher type American CIA operative observes the "enhanced interrogation" (instead of the dead Jackal thug who would normally do it) and is unsure whether to keep it going or try to stop it. He was sitting in the car next to the dead Jackal who was accidentally killed by shrapnel and he was thus covered in Jackal blood, so he was understandably a bit irritated by the event. In the meantime, Reese Witherspoon tries to find her suddenly, inexplicably, missing husband, despite being heavily pregnant and about to pop, but the cold and nasty person behind the Rendition, (scary Meryl Streep) refuses to help or give her any information. You may need to watch the movie twice to get all the twists in the plot. This movie is based on several real cases of kidnapped and tortured innocent people and some of the illegal kidnap flights carrying these victims of US "justice" have reportedly been through EU and UK airspace. The DVD helpfully includes a documentary on the subject of Rendition, in special features, for any citizen of the world still unaware of the practice. This mainstream movie was probably as brave as it could be in sticking its neck out, given the current ultra-right wing "Corporatocracy" type political climate of the USA.

Just about watchable but essentially another film having a pop at the CIA and by proxy the US governments nationa security policy. Whether that is right or wrong is a hugely complex debate which cannot be answered in a film. Nonetheless there are films that attempt to do this much more successfully than Rendition does - See Zero Dark Thirty or The Torture Report for example.Solid cast but underwhelming performances and the ending is childish and wholly unrealistic. Gyllenhaal magically convinces the interior minister to release his prisoner even though that is never on the cards, he quickly ships him off on a boat. Cut to the victim being magically reunited with his family. That just would not happen. It actually serves to completely trivialise and make a mockery of the real life innocent detainees who experienced far worse than the film dares to depict and then makes out that they could all have been saved by rogue but "nice" CIA officers.Ok it is fictitious but when you are so clearly trying to labour a very serious point then at least be accurate or moreover, have some semblance of balance.

Still a good film that looks at a very difficult subject without overstating it's case or outstaying it's welcome by being overlong. It remains a work of fiction in the political thriller category and has such has moments when the sympathy is overlaid ( I wondered why the distraught wife had to be pregnant wasn't the horrendous fact that she didn't have a clue where her husband was or how he was being treated enough?) and the ending was clever but rather convoluted for a film that wants you to believe it is based on what really happens. Yet it did give good insights and kept me interested and also wondering how many times a rendition like this has happened to innocent people in the name of terrorism and political point scoring. Add to this some fine performances and its certainly a film worth watching.

"I fear you speak upon the rack, where men enforced do speak anything" A line from the 16th Century William Shakespeare play; The Merchant of Venice Act III, Scene II. This dramatic film made for excellent viewing, and with an wonderfully talented cast, Peter Sarsgaard playing Senator Hawkins (Alan Arkin) understudy Alan Smith, has the task of verifying a former peer (Omar Metwally) from his alma mater. However, he has been taken away under counter terrorism measures back to the place of his birth Egypt. (Spoiler Alert) This is were another storyline in the film takes a twist, you get your haunch verified when the target of a suicide bomber is actually the father of the daughter who has befriended the would be bomber. The film is wonderfully written and the cast is exceptional featuring Meryl Streep, JK Simmons, Igal Naor.

This film does an excellent job detailing the ambiguity surrounding terrorist suspects, and especially the moral and legal ambiguity surrounding extraordinary rendition. Extraordinary rendition is STILL practiced by intelligence services. This is a simple fact, and it is worth questioning because innocent people HAVE been taken and later released. Major newspapers have written articles about this. Intelligence work is difficult and requires different approaches and methods than the average person is familiar with, but that doesn't mean that they are "a priori" outside the purview of ethical evaluation. We all want to be kept safe, but the world will never be completely safe and if we sacrifice all of our own standards of behavior, we lose what we are fighting for in the first place. Rendition, as a film, explores this difficult grey area and also injects the demands of political life felt by "decision makers". Especially appreciated is how the film questioned the efficiency of torture and how it can lead to producing more enemies. Highly recommended for those who want to know the middle ground between the trump cards "national security" and "individual freedom".