A shadow epic
Feb 20
I can't think of a movie that's quite like Syriana in terms of its feel. It's a huge movie, but it's not capital-e Epic in the way that we usually think of that form. There are no armies massing in the desert, no swelling strings as the lovers do their tragic whatever in the midst of the surge and chaos of the something something.
It's writ small. The dialogue is not explicative. It's like a furtive hand motion that you need to interpret, but all the information is there nonetheless.
It's discouraging, but discouraging in the way that reality occasionally is.
Above all, it feels like massive forces are at work underneath, roiling the waters but only showing a ripple on the surface.