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The Tampa Tribune

Published: September 21, 2007

IN THE VALLEY OF ELAH **½

The title is a bit of a head-scratcher but the message is unmistakable. Writer-director Paul Haggis couldn't have made it more clear if he'd blared it from a bullhorn - and in the film's final image, he practically does.

With 'In the Valley of Elah,' his follow-up to the stirring, Academy Award-winning 'Crash,' Haggis gives us an indictment of the Iraq war and its effect on the returning troops and their families. A necessary and relevant topic, to be sure, but one that Haggis approaches with mixed results.

Fundamentally, 'Elah' is a standard procedural, with Vietnam vet and former military policeman Hank Deerfield (Tommy Lee Jones) teaming up with Detective Emily Sanders (Charlize Theron) to uncover what happened to his son, Mike, a soldier who goes AWOL after coming back from Iraq and is later found savagely killed.

The performances are so strong, though, they elevate the film beyond its limitations. Jones perpetuates the stoic, surly persona he's perfected, but there's an undercurrent of aching sadness that makes him more accessible and human than ever before. And Theron, as a no-nonsense investigator who's tired of being underestimated by her male colleagues, is every bit his equal.

Oh, and about that title? It comes from the Old Testament, the site of the battle between David and Goliath. Haggis has said he views the troops as David in the equation, but Hank could be David, too, taking on the Goliath of American military bureaucracy that's keeping him from the truth.

120 minutes (R; violent and disturbing content, profanity and some sexuality/nudity)

THE HUNTING PARTY ***

With 2005's 'The Matador,' writer-director Richard Shepard slyly and effectively mined the possibilities of dark humor in a deadly situation: a washed-up hit man on the verge of burnout.

This time, he applies the same tactic in an even bleaker place: Bosnia, where a group of journalists seeks a wanted war criminal known as The Fox to ... interview him? Capture him?

Even they're not quite sure what they'd do if they found him.

Shepard has made a rock 'n' roll war postwar picture, one that's slick but has something to say. And he strikes just the right absurd, satirical tone until near the end, when he allows the film to take some convenient turns that wrap things up a bit too neatly.

Richard Gere, Terrence Howard and Jesse Eisenberg play off each other beautifully throughout, though, as the mismatched trio whose adventures are based on some of the real-life events detailed in an Esquire magazine article by Scott Anderson.

As veteran TV news correspondent Simon Hunt, Gere has an epic meltdown live on air and hopes that this scoop will revive his career. Howard plays his longtime photographer who lands a cushy network job but ends up getting sucked back into the field. And Eisenberg is the jittery newbie - a television executive's son - who's along for the ride.

For most of the time, 'The Hunting Party' has a real edge to it. That's why it's so baffling when the film goes soft in its explanation for Simon's collapse, and in the fate that befalls The Fox.

War is messy, and a movie that so vividly depicts its messiness shouldn't end so tidily.

103 minutes (R; profanity and violent content)

Christy Lemire,

The Associated Press

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