Redacted

A largely incompetent if somewhat ballsy attempt to fictionalize the Mahmudiyah killings, wherein five U.S. servicemen raped and murdered a 14-year-old Iraqi girl and killed her entire family. Brian De Palma’s tone-deaf script is a set of speeches and stereotypes, and while it’s nice to see that someone isn’t afraid to criticize U.S. troops, it’s too bad that it had to be done at this incredibly low level of competence. Amateurish acting, scenes that form a shallow parody of a French documentary and dialogue that sounds like it was yanked from a 1940s American propaganda film combine to produce a rather silly film—one that’s sure to offend a lot of people. It’s not completely boring, and De Palma is at least interested in raising difficult issues, but on the whole, this is about as good as the average Lifetime TV movie.