Currently Browsing: "Mark Boal"

It’s Academy Awards time again, and even though we all know the awards are basically an irrelevant exercise in mutual masturbation it’s still fun to watch. This year sees a wide variety of films gain entry into Oscar history via nominations for Best Screenplay, Original and Adapted. Some deserve the honor, while others are based on the novel “Push” by Sapphire.

Even though Kathryn Bigelow’s intense Iraq war thriller The Hurt Locker hit theaters back on June 26, that sure won’t stop me from writing about it — it is perhaps the best film that will hit theaters in 2009.

Screenwriter Mark Boal and director Kathryn Bigelow share the methods they used to create an intense, heartfelt combat film. We talk camera angles, mistaken journalists, and cleaning the dust off after coming in from the desert.

In a very real sense, this movie is the first of its kind. The first boots-on-the-ground Iraq War film. It immediately places the audience in the dusty streets of Baghdad and refuses to let anyone leave until the end.