Movie: Syriana (P, S)

Syriana is a difficult movie in both its content and its construction. It has multiple converging plotlines with one central focus: oil. The nature of truth is at issue here as well, because the people who know what's going on won't tell--and always have a clever lie up their sleeves in case anyone ever asks.

For the first two-thirds of the movie, I felt like I had been dropped into a foreign culture--with a language meant to conceal rather than reveal. CIA agents have conversations without revealing what they know--until it is time to put a hit on someone's life. Corporate executives speak quite freely in the boardroom but deny everything once they leave the building. Religious fundamentalists lure potential targets by affirming the core beliefs of the disenfranchised in the hopes of getting those people to take their own lives.

Everyone's talking, but no one is saying what they mean.

As if this were not dangerous and disturbing enough, everyone plays this game for the most vulgar prize of all: oil is money, and money rules all.

The last twenty minutes brought all the storylines together in a completely unnerving way. This movie challenged me personally and intellectually, and I intend to watch it again to see what I missed. Grade: A-