The Kingdom (film)

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The Kingdom

Promotional poster
Directed by Peter Berg
Produced by Michael Mann
Scott Stuber
Written by Matthew Michael Carnahan
Starring Jamie Foxx
Ashraf Barhom
Chris Cooper
Jennifer Garner
Jason Bateman
Kyle Chandler
Richard Jenkins
Jeremy Piven
Ali Suliman
Music by Danny Elfman
Cinematography Mauro Fiore
Editing by Colby Parker Jr.
Kevin Stitt
Studio Relativity Media
Distributed by Universal Pictures
Release dates August 22, 2007 (2007-08-22) (EIFF)
September 28, 2007
(United States)
October 11, 2007 (Germany)
Running time 109 minutes
Country United States
Germany
Language English
Arabic
Budget $70 million
Box office $86,579,130

The Kingdom is a 2007 action film directed by Peter Berg and starring Jamie Foxx, Chris Cooper, Jennifer Garner, Jason Bateman, and Ashraf Barhom, with Kyle Chandler, Jeremy Piven, Richard Jenkins, and Ali Suliman.

The film is fictional but inspired by bombings at the Riyadh compound on May 12, 2003 and the Khobar housing complex on June 26, 1996, in the kingdom of Saudi Arabia. The story follows a team of FBI agents who investigate the bombing of a foreign-workers facility in Saudi Arabia. Screenwriter Matthew Michael Carnahan has summarized the plot as, "What would a murder investigation look like on Mars?”[1]

The film was screened at the Edinburgh International Film Festival as its yearly "surprise" film on 22 August 2007.[2]

Plot

During a softball game at an American oil company housing compound in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, al-Qaeda terrorists set off a bomb, killing Americans and Saudis. While one team hijacks a car and shoots residents, a suicide bomber blows himself up, killing everyone near him. Sergeant Haytham (Ali Suliman), of the Saudi State Police, disables a stolen Saudi Police vehicle and kills the terrorists in it. The FBI Legal Attaché in Saudi Arabia, Special Agent Fran Manner (Kyle Chandler), calls his US colleague, Special Agent Ronald Fleury (Jamie Foxx), to advise him about the attack. Manner is discussing with DSS Regional Security Officer Special Agent Rex Bura how to secure the crime scene when a second bomb explodes in the compound, killing Manner, Bura and many others.

At FBI Headquarters in Washington, D.C., Fleury briefs his rapid deployment team on the attack. During the briefing, Fleury whispered to Mayes to calm her down when she knew the death of Manner. Although the U.S. Justice Department and the U.S. State Department hinder FBI efforts to investigate the attack, Fleury blackmails the Saudi ambassador into allowing an FBI investigative team into Saudi Arabia. Fleury and Special Agent Janet Mayes (Jennifer Garner), a forensic examiner, Adam Leavitt (Jason Bateman), an intelligence analyst, and Special Agent Grant Sykes (Chris Cooper), a bomb technician, go to Saudi Arabia. On arrival they are met by Colonel Faris al-Ghazi (Ashraf Barhom), the commander of the Saudi State Police Force providing security at the compound. The investigation is being run by General Al Abdulmalik (Mahmoud Said) of the Saudi National Guard, who does not give Fleury and his team permission to investigate but only to observe the Saudi investigation.

The FBI team is invited to the palace of Saudi Prince Ahmed bin Khaled (Omar Berdouni) for a dinner. While at the palace, Fleury persuades the Prince that Colonel al-Ghazi is a natural detective and should be allowed to lead the investigation. With this change in leadership, the Americans are allowed hands-on access to the crime scene. While searching for evidence, Sergeant Haytham and Sykes discover the second bomb was detonated in an ambulance. Fleury learns the brother of one of the dead terrorists had access to ambulances and police uniforms. Colonel al-Ghazi orders a SWAT team to raid a house, managing to kill a few heavily armed terrorists. Following the raid, the team discovers valuable clues, including photos of the U.S. and other Western embassies in Riyadh. Soon afterward, the U.S. Embassy Deputy Chief of Mission Damon Schmidt (Jeremy Piven) notifies Fleury and his team that they have been ordered to return to the United States.

On their way to King Khalid International Airport, Fleury grabs the wheel from Sergeant Haytham, which allows them to partially evade the collision of a speeding car with the first SUV in their convoy, setting off a trunk full of explosives. Their SUV, the third in their convoy, hits the first SUV. The fourth SUV drives up and the men inside pull out Leavitt, throwing him into the back and driving away while a second car drives by to shoot the surviving Americans. Fleury manages to wound one attacker, and al-Ghazi commandeers a civilian vehicle to chase the fourth SUV and the other car into the dangerous Al-Suwaidi neighborhood of Riyadh. As they pull up, a gunman launches rocket-propelled grenades at them and a fierce firefight starts. Inside the complex, Leavitt is tied up and gagged.

While Sykes and Haytham watch the entrance to the complex, al-Ghazi, Fleury, and Mayes follow a blood trail and manage to kill many gunmen inside. Mayes, separated from the others, enters an apartment to find a family with little children, their mother, and grandfather. She yells at them to stay put and goes across the hall to another apartment, where she finds Leavitt and his attackers. She kills the remaining insurgents, and al-Ghazi and the team start to leave. Mayes give the little girl a lollipop. In return, the girl gives her a marble, matching those pieced together earlier from the bomb scene. Fleury then realizes there is a trail of blood leading to the back of the apartment, and al-Ghazi sees the grandfather, suspects something, and asks to help him up in order to inspect his hand. When the old man gives him his hand, al-Ghazi sees that the man is missing the same fingers as Abu Hamza al-Masri[3] in the terrorist group's many videos and confirms his suspicion that the grandfather is the terrorist leader. Abu Hamza's teenage grandson walks out of the bedroom and manages to shoot al-Ghazi in the neck twice with a pistol before it jams, then he starts to point his gun at Mayes, prompting Fleury to kill him. Abu Hamza then feebly pulls out an assault rifle and Haytham puts three shots in his chest. As Abu Hamza dies, another grandson hugs him and Abu Hamza whispers something into his ear to calm the child down. Al-Ghazi dies in Fleury's arms.

At al-Ghazi's house, Fleury and Haytham meet his family. Fleury tells his son that al-Ghazi was his good friend, mirroring a similar scene earlier in the movie wherein he comforted Special Agent Manner's son. Fleury and his team return to the U.S., where they are commended by FBI Director James Grace (Richard Jenkins) for their outstanding work. Leavitt asked Fleury and Mayes what he had whispered to her to clam her down. The scene cuts to Abu Hamza's daughter asking her own son what his grandfather whispered to him as he was dying. The grandson tells her mother, "Don't fear them, my child. We are going to kill them all". This is almost the same as what Fleury whispered to Mayes. Implying that this is a never-ending, vicious cycle.

Cast

Production

Prior to filming, director Peter Berg spent two weeks in Saudi Arabia researching the film.[4] Filming commenced July 10, 2006, on the west side of the old Maricopa County Courthouse in Phoenix, Arizona. Additional scenes were being filmed concurrently in Mesa, Arizona; the scenes at the American compound were shot at the Polytechnic campus of Arizona State University.[5] In some of the trailer frames, saguaro cacti not native to Saudi Arabia are visible in the background. The scenes in the men's locker room at the beginning of the film were filmed in the men's locker room and detention area of the Gilbert Police Department. The FBI briefing scene was filmed in the media amphitheater/classroom in the same police building. The high speed driving scenes were filmed on Highway 202, which runs through Mesa and Gilbert, just prior to its opening for public use only a few miles from the ASU campus.

While shooting on location in Mesa, Berg was involved in a fatal accident that resulted in the death of another member of the production team. The SUV he was riding in collided with a John Deere Gator all-terrain vehicle driven by Nick Papac. Papac died three hours later. On August 8, 2008, Papac's parents Michael Papac and Michele Bell filed a lawsuit against the director, a driver, and the production company.[6] The lawsuit was dropped in 2008.[7] Filming resumed one day after the incident.

On-location filming took place in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates for two weeks in mid-September.[4] Since Universal Pictures does not have an office in the Middle East, the production was facilitated by a local production firm called Filmworks, based in Dubai.[8] Filming also took place at the Emirates Palace hotel in Abu Dhabi.[9][10]

The film's production cost $80 million.[11] The Kingdom was released on DVD December 20, 2007.

Reception

Western reception

The film received moderate reviews from critics. Review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes reports that 51% of 180 critics have given the film a positive review, with a rating average of 5.8 out of 10. The site's general consensus is that "While providing several top-notch action scenes, The Kingdom ultimately collapses under the weight of formula and muddled politics."[12] Metacritic, which assigns a normalized rating out of 0—100 reviews from film critics, has a rating score of 56 based on 37 reviews.[13] Right-wing Weekly Standard columnist John Podhoretz called the film "perfectly paced" and "remarkably crisp and satisfying", arguing that it evokes the films The Taking of Pelham One Two Three, Dog Day Afternoon, and The New Centurions.[14] New York Times critic A.O. Scott called it "a slick, brutishly effective genre movie". He also stated that "Just as Rambo offered the fantasy of do-over on Vietnam, The Kingdom can be seen as a wishful revisionist scenario for the American response to Islamic fundamentalist terrorism."[15] Evan Williams of The Australian called it "an excellent thriller" and stated that it "may be the first Hollywood film to confront Saudi involvement in international terrorism."[16]

New York Post critic Lou Lumenick stated that "Hollywood provides the Islamic world another reason to hate America with The Kingdom," calling it "xenophobic" and "pandering."[17] AV Club critic Scott Tobias gave the movie a C, criticizing the movie's "queasy brand of escapism" by offering the audience the pleasure of "[w]inning imaginary wars" and giving an idealized portrayal of the efficiency of American intelligence. He says the film appeals to the audience's "basest instincts" and that, despite one sympathetic Arab character, the filme could be tarred as racist.[18] Lisa Schwarzbaum of Entertainment Weekly accused the film of "treating its audience like cash-dispensing machines".[19] Kenneth Turan of The Los Angeles Times called it "a slick excuse for efficient mayhem that's not half as smart as it would like to be." He added that "the film's thematic similarity to those jingoistic World War II-era 'Yellow Peril' films makes it hard not to feel your humanity being diminished."

Middle Eastern reception

Faisal Abbas, media editor of the London-based international Arabic journal Asharq Al Awsat, wrote on the newspaper's English website that "despite some aspects which might be perceived by some as negative, many might be pleasantly surprised after watching this film, bearing in mind that Arabs have for a long time been among Hollywood's favorite villains." Faisal concluded that "In all cases, the film is definitely action-packed, and perhaps Saudis and Arabs may enjoy it more than Americans, as events are depicted as taking place in the Saudi capital…and it is not every day that you watch a Hollywood-style car chase happening on the streets of Riyadh. For Westerners, the movie might be an interesting “insight” to a culture that is very different to their own."[20]

In a review titled One good Arab for The Guardian, Palestinian writer Sharif Nashashibi says the film is one in a long tradition of Western works where Arabs are villified and Americans are portrayed as heroes, only bothering to add "a token Arab 'good guy'", equating good with pro-American, "to make up for the fact that the rest of the Arab characters are bad." All other Arab characters in the movie, he says, "are portrayed negatively - from the brutal, hate-filled, anti-western, religiously fanatical terrorists, to the inept, corrupt, heavy-handed, secretive and frustratingly bureaucratic Saudi authorities", as opposed to the "humanity, grief, compassion, determination, ability and patriotism of most of the American characters". He concludes that "The Kingdom perpetuates negative stereotypes for a quick buck and an adrenaline rush, at a time in the world where breeding such ignorance and prejudice has proven catastrophic." He also took issue with star Jamie Foxx's anti-Arab comments to the US press despite being "treated 'like royalty"' in the United Arab Emirates" during the shooting.[21]

Box office performance

The film grossed $17.1 million in 2,733 theatres in the United States and Canada on its opening weekend, ranking #2 at the box office.[22] It also grossed £919,537 in the United Kingdom,[11] about $1.9 million.[23] As of December 15, 2007, the film has grossed an estimated $47,536,778 in the United States and $39,042,352 at the foreign box office with a worldwide gross of $86,579,130.[24]

The film has been extremely successful in the rental market, grossing $77.4 million in the United States as of April 13, 2008.[25]

The film had been banned in several Arab countries for claims of being biased against Saudi treatment with terrorism.[citation needed]

See also


References

  1. ↑ Review, from The New York Times, June 19, 2007
  2. ↑ "Edinburgh Film Festival Gets a Surprise Trip to 'The Kingdom'". Cinematical. August 26, 2007. 
  3. ↑ (Arabic: أبو حمزة المصري, Abū Ḥamzah al-Maṣrī) born Mustafa Kamel Mustafa
  4. ↑ 4.0 4.1 The Kingdom's Peter Berg
  5. ↑ "ASU Campus makes big screen debut in 'Kingdom'". ASU State Press. 1 October 2007. 
  6. ↑ "'Hancock' director sued over death". CNN. 2008-08-08. Retrieved 2008-09-14. 
  7. ↑ "Lawsuit dropped against director Berg". ContactMusic. 2008-12-08. Retrieved 2009-07-30. 
  8. ↑ Jaafar, Ali (December 3, 2006). "Dubai surfaces as regional film hub". Variety. 
  9. ↑ Nos. 51 and 52: Peter Berg, Director of 'The Kingdom' – Esquire
  10. ↑ Gorov, Lynda (September 23, 2007). "Feeling the heat". The Boston Globe. 
  11. ↑ 11.0 11.1 The Kingdom (2007) – Box office / business
  12. ↑ "The Kingdom (2007)". Rotten Tomatoes. IGN Entertainment. Retrieved January 13, 2009. 
  13. ↑ "The Kingdom: Reviews". Metacritic. CNET Networks. Retrieved January 13, 2009. 
  14. ↑ One for the Good Guys The Weekly Standard
  15. ↑ Scott, A. O. (September 28, 2007). "F.B.I. Agents Solve the Terrorist Problem". The New York Times. Retrieved May 25, 2010. 
  16. ↑ Williams, Evan (October 6, 2007). "Into an Arabian gulf". The Australian. 
  17. ↑ Lumenick, Lou (September 28, 2007). "The King-Dumb". New York Post. 
  18. ↑ "The Kingdom". Av Club. Sep 27, 2007. 
  19. ↑ "Movie Review: The Kingdom". Entertainment Weekly. 
  20. ↑ Asharq Alawsat Newspaper (English)
  21. ↑ "One good Arab". The Guardian. 29 October 2007. 
  22. ↑ "The Kingdom (2007) – Weekend Box Office". Box Office Mojo. Retrieved 2007-10-24. 
  23. ↑ As of October 21, 2007 using Yahoo!Finance
  24. ↑ "The Kingdom (2007) – International Box Office". Box Office Mojo. Retrieved 2007-10-21. 
  25. ↑ "Weekly DVD/Home Video Rentals, April 7–13, 2008". Box Office Mojo. Retrieved 2008-04-29. 

External links

Films directed by Peter Berg
Films produced by Scott Stuber
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