Syriana appraisal
SYRIANA is more than just a clever geo-political drama, it is the epoch of the time. When it was written, oil futures had reached an all time high, the U.S was deep into what we now know as a free grab of oil property and a pre-emptive war with a high number of casualties. Oil has become an intrinsic part of our daily lives. The price of the commodity, its availability and value has become part of our universal consciousness. Whether we acknowledge it or not, we are oil and our collective futures hinge on its cheap availability, making us all accountable.
As I see it, Syriana’s purpose, as written, was to tutor the general Joe Public movie goer on how the world of high stakes commodities and power plays work. Prior to Syraina I doubt very many people made connections between political will, big business desire and motivation. Joe Public simply went to the gas station, filled up, complained about the price of petrol and maybe collect a weighty ‘ho hum’ when the nightly news anchor mentioned anything about middle eastern conflicts. That was as far as it went.
The Character Bryan Woodman got it right when he said to Prince Nasir, “The business world thought that you were running around chopping each other’s heads off one hundred years ago.” It may be fair to say that Joe Public thinks that’s what’s been happening for the last hundred years.
Does it succeed as a tutor? The truth is this is a complex multi-layered story with four or five strands that take a while to link. It is not a story where the details are easily accessible. Blink and you may get lost.
This is the nature of the subject matter. If you already have thorough knowledge of America’s involvement of the middle east or the economics of the oil and gas industries you have a head start. Nonetheless, what Syriana provides is an insightful, thought provoking and convoluted story interweaving loose connections between related and unrelated systems – east and west religious dogma, right wing agenda and capitalistic efficiency.
With subject matter like this, one is predisposed to embrace it, so maybe I am making excuses for it when I say: Being surrounded by the interwoven chaos and not grasping the whole picture is a strength because it is similar to the situation for the characters involved. In this script the audience is intentionally surrounded by problems and unlike most Hollywood scripts we are not presented with solutions. We are presented with the messy situation at hand. So don’t try to understand it too much. You will just dig deeper into the labyrinth and fail to get swept away by the characters. In fact, if getting swept away by characters and understanding their motives on a passionate level is what you are after this movie may not be for you. This is not a character driven piece. That is not its intention.
The themes are made profoundly clear with quotes like:
“We have laws against it precisely so we can get away with it. Corruption is our protection. Corruption is what keeps us safe and warm. Corruption is why you and I are prancing around here instead of fighting each other for scraps of meat out in the streets. Corruption is why we win.”
The above quote is just an example of the kind of dialogue throughout this film; often blatant and, some may argue, unbelievable. A lot of the time, characters don’t converse as much as they speak in semi-monologues; heavy and didactic. But I like to think that that is how they speak in the world of the white super-power people eaters.
Bryan Woodman and his wife, Julie, watch their son who is too afraid to jump into the pool.
A bigger BOY fakes like he might push him in. Bryan starts to his feet –
Julie: Don’t. Let him work it out. It’s important for his autonomy.
The underlying message being: leave the middle east alone. But even it’s attempt at subtextual dialogue feels clunky and obvious at times.
It succeeds more when the powerful presence of James “Jimmy” Pope speaks at a meeting with Killeen.
Jimmy: I want to talk about the Gulf and how a goddamn E-mir, what is an E-mir anyway?
This sentence signals the misunderstanding and disrespect between western and eastern cultures. Just one of the many themes explored in this script.
The five main characters – Bob, Wasim, Prince Nasir, Bennett and Bryan – are quick to get mixed up in greed, ambition and self interest. This is reflected and spurred on by family problems – the relationship between fathers and sons is the film’s threading motif, although not fully explored. How can it be explored in a movie so jammed packed with characters, theme and story-line? It does, however, provide the movie’s attempt at humanising the characters and giving a flimsy reason to why they are the way they are in this very masculine world. For some, mainly Bennett and Bryan, sinking themselves in the world of money, politics and power is a way to escape family pressures and mutual disappointments. Again, this is not an exploration of character. It does not concern itself with the usual Hollywood emotional involvement, therefore, not one of these characters can fully attain the audience’s sympathy. The problem with that is you can lose half the audience.
Unless I’m missing something, I find their principles, or moral compass, have not been developed enough for their actions to matter to the audience. It is a shame, developing that would never let a script down.
Bob Baer
The first story strand follows Bob Baer, a CIA agent in Tehran. He supplies two missiles to the Amiri brothers and is disturbed to find that one has been passed on to an Arab. Later, Bob sends an unwelcome memo to the CIA informing them of the missing missile. They send him back to Beirut to keep him quiet.
Naturally, Bob’s character has twists and turns like no other character. He is the most complex and interesting, mainly because his moral compass is tested more often and he has a defined arc. He does in fact develop a conscience at the end. It is this conscience that kills him. An apt ending for this unHollywood movie.
In fact, I think there should be another movie – all about Bob. This time give his wife and son a little more screen time and development. It may even reach a broader audience this time. But that’s just me.
Bob’s son is also an interesting character. Unfortunately his time on the page is fleeting. A teenager’s point of view in this masculine mid-aged dominated society is a nice change.
We never see the reaction of Bob’s wife at the end, which begs the question, why is she there throughout the movie? Does her character reveal more information integral to the story? I don’t think so. Does she reveal another side to Bob? Hardly. She could evoke more of an emotional investment to the character but we have established that this is of little concern to this story.
Bennett Holiday
The writer has made it important to Bennett’s story that he is a minority – a black man. This opens up another can of worms in a script that’s already a crammed tin of sardines, which may explain why it isn’t fully developed, yet developed enough for the reader to understand that this is one of his main motivations – being independent and as good as, or better than, the white power-hungry oil men. Motivation, even a flimsy one, is good. Or maybe it is meant to serve as a parallel to the importance of autonomy, including states and countries, that is a theme throughout.
You get the sense that this is a man who wouldn’t play so dirty if everyone around stopped pushing him to play that way. Or he wouldn’t play so dirty if he didn’t feel like a representation of the oppressed black man. The theme of ‘repression leads to playing dirty’ is also reflected in Wassim’s character. So slowly the links between characters come together. But does it have to be so dense? This is hardly appreciated by a broad audience.
In the same way that Bob Baer is disconnected with his son, we could say the same for Bennett and his dad – Bob’s opposing character. In a way, like most things in this film, they mirror each other. Bob’s son tries to tell Bob he is doing wrong and Bennett’s father tries to tell Bennett the same, alluding to Bennett that he is being a lap dog to the white man. But it isn’t clear. It is a weak representation that doesn’t really lead anywhere. Like a lot of things in this script that turn out to be no more than raised-eyebrows and hints, the background development just isn’t strong enough for the audience to care.
Questioning these characters to do the morally right thing for your family or society is one that should and needs to be asked. It’s a shame it is played out so weak at times. The family pressures, in return, sometimes become a mere vapor of a theme.
Bryan Woodman.
Woodman is an American energy analyst who lives in Geneva with his wife and two children. The Emir invites him and his family to a party. Tragedy strikes when the older child is killed. Prince Nasir later invites Woodman to the Emirate and gives him a $75 million contract and makes him his economic advisor.
The family pressures in Woodman’s character is clear and the theme of repression appears again in the way he chooses to deal with his son’s death – by throwing himself into the world of money, power and politics under the pretence that he is doing it for his family, although, it is true he is a family man more than any other character. This is why we see him return to his family in his last scene. This is vaguely important. Well, it’s a nice way to round him up. One of these characters should be a genuine family man.
Woodman and the audience discover that Prince Nasir could possibly be the only humane, forward-thinking man in the story. His motives are to move his country away from economic dependance on America and introduce democracy. Good for him. The audience like him. Set up nicely. There’s the autonomy theme again. But the power hungry American man has decided that if he isn’t going with Killeen he must be a threat. They get Baer on the case to arrange Nasir’s assassination.
This is a nice piece of story-line that is mainly all done through dialogue. Didactic but acceptable.
Wasim
Wasim is part of a group of Pakistani immigrant workers. They arrive at work one morning to be told that the Chinese have taken over from the American company, Connex, so they no longer have jobs. Wasim finds it impossible to get work, forcing him into the orbit of a fundamentalist Muslim cleric. He is soon – a little too soon – groomed to become a suicide bomber.
The script challenges thoughts on suicide bombers; dispelling some cliched thinking about a heaven full of virgins. It brings up the apt issue of repression/opression fueling fundamentalism. Unfortunately, though, in terms of story this seams to be the script’s weakest effort. The inability to find work does not seem, in this case, to be a strong enough motive for Wassim to become a martyr. Although it could be. It just needs tweaking. A few more scenes where we see him and his faith tested perhaps.
The ending has a rare and successful display of show don’t tell than any other part of the script. One could even say It parallels the selling of weaponry to Iraq by the Reagan Administration. Maybe I am getting off track, but if this is the sort of conversation a script like this can evoke then it is important to get it off the ground.
For some, the dense cerebral approach to this film will make it a rewarding experience.
But with all the effort in writing such an integral story and message, why only make it accessible to a limited amount of people?
As long as the writer doesn’t become the director of this film, it will be a fine film of our time indeed. your essay in here…