Zero Dark Thirty (2012) Review

 

Zero Dark Thirty (2012)

Zero Dark Thirty follows the 10 year journey from the events of 9/11 to the raid of Osama Bin Laden’s compound and subsequent assassination.

For starters, lower your expectations going into this. If you go in expecting it to be a classic war/thriller, you’ll probably be disappointed in some fashion. It’s a slow burn that gradually unravels itself, covering a wide variety of topics from torture, to the ethical and mental ramifications working on such a high level case will bring you. It’s also not very accurate, like at all, which is fine because it is a movie adaptation of true events, but if that was the case and they didn’t bother with accuracy, why not take it a few steps further and make it more enjoyable, as it is essentially just a 5 year battle for people to believe our main character, with lots and lots of waiting in between. Pretty much making a fairly uninteresting film until the final raid, which in itself was still iffy.

This movie also suffers from having a weak lead, with Jessica Chastain not doing bad, as she made the role her own, but it just came off as forceful and whiny, instead of powerful. I did however enjoy the brief appearances from Chris Pratt, Joel Edgerton, Jason Clarke, Jennifer Ehle, and Mark Strong. Chastain’s best moment for her character though, comes at the end, with her 100% certainty that Bin Laden would be in the compound, finally seeing his body, and confirming it, even though she is a mentally shattered and compromised character. It was great, and left things on a mysterious and questionable note, just like the real life events.

Zero Dark, even with it’s faults, was still an entertaining and gripping story that took a story we knew a little about, and shed a different light on it. It falls flat as it takes place over such a long period of time though, making it feel repetitive and unnecessary, but that’s the struggle and risk with making a real life to film adaptation. The ending, with it’s reenactment and use of night vision mode, was a neat addition, adding a clever immersion tactic to a movie that had a hard time finding it’s footing, especially with an anticlimactic finish.

4.9/10