Do not go into The Kingdom expecting to come out with a Hollywood version of how the US involvement in Saudi Arabia should end. Peter Berg’s new film is full of hard questions and not so easy answers and sheds a little light into the dark corner that is our understanding of what’s happening in the Middle East. At least, that’s what they want you to think.

The film opens with an incredibly beautiful graphic-based history of oil in Saudi Arabia and the United States’ interest in it. According to the film, we Americans were pretty much there from day one, keeping ourselves vested in the outcome of all the infighting and back-stabbing. We get a brief, simplistic look at how terrorism might have evolved out of the events of the sixties and seventies and how those events led to September 11, 2001. Needless to say, by the time the opening credits are over, the whole audience is in a state of upheaval. We’re tense and anxious and really want some relief. Continue reading “Review: The Kingdom” →