IN THE VALLEY

OF ELAH

 

 

 

 

by Steve Taylor

 

Among the first images of IN THE VALLEY OF ELAH, director Paul Haggis' film about a missing soldier just home from Iraq, is an American flag flying upside down. "That's a sign of a nation in distress," says the soldier's father, Hank Deerfield, a Vietnam vet played with harrowing intensity by Tommy Lee Jones.

Haggis, whose first feature, Crash, won the 2006 Oscar for best picture, has ascended from his early screenwriting days to become not only one of Hollywood's most ambitious filmmakers (he wrote the Oscar-nominated Million Dollar Baby) but also a prominent anti-war agitator. So it is no surprise that his second feature is crafted as a wake-up call to Americans who may be avoiding the awful truths about the Iraq war. Based on a true story, IN THE VALLEY OF ELAH is a psychological drama about post-traumatic stress disorder dressed up as a murder mystery. The formula is a good one. It allows Haggis to tell a bruising yarn about the trauma caused by war while serving up a tautly paced, emotional thriller. Charlize Theron appears as a tough-talking detective who helps Deerfield uncover the mystery of his son Michael's disappearance. Susan Sarandon is wonderful, if underused, as Deerfield's bereft wife, her eyes telling her grief when she learns her son's fate.

IN THE VALLEY OF ELAH is an effective, disturbing and subtle exploration of the stateside war story. The word trauma is never uttered, but it is at the core of every interaction. Doe-eyed, brawny soldiers deliver lines like "They shouldn't send heroes to places like Iraq" and, in defense of unspeakable atrocities, "It was just a way to cope; we all do stupid things.” Also magnifying the film's we're-in-trouble message is Roger Deakins' austere cinematography—mostly of barren New Mexico landscapes where even the wind seems buttoned up—and Mark Isham's taut score.  But Jones is the film's key force, giving one of the best performances of his career. His Deerfield is both an embodiment of military-hewed patriotism—he shines his shoes daily—and of American political innocence (he doesn't know the worst about the war either). Indeed, it is through Jones' performance as a father in search of his son that we journey into Iraq's blood-soaked darkness, to the fleeting, indelible images of casual civilian deaths and torture perpetrated by Americans.

Like many of the upcoming films fictionalizing Iraq this fall movie season, Haggis makes liberal use of documentary-style soldier videos. Mike Deerfield's homemade videos, unearthed by his father, are like Hansel's bread crumbs: clues to why and when the young soldier got lost. They may be a cheap way to show Baghdad, but their blurry, cut-up images work well as a metaphor for Americans' sketchy grasp of the conflict.

In history, the valley of Elah is the place where David fought Goliath—the place, as Jones' character says, where David first had to overcome his fear and then fight a terrifying monster of an enemy. Haggis' contribution with this film is to show that, regarding Iraq, the monstrous is all around us—on the battlefield, at home and in the mind.

 

Steve Taylor is a retired attorney and magistrate who is a member of the Southeastern Film Critics Association. His criticism may also be heard each Friday on WHQR-FM (91.3)