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Starring: George Clooney, Matt Damon, Jeffrey Wright, Amanda Peet, Tim Blake Nelson
Directed by: Stephen Gaghan
Director Stephen Gaghan is no stranger to writing about addiction. His screenplays have tackled the drug trade (the excellent Traffic) and white kids buying crack in the hood (the abysmal Havoc). With Syriana, Gaghan delivers his most convincing work yet, detailing how geopolitics, religion and corruption affect the veins through which courses America's number-one addiction: oil. "When a country has five percent of the world's population but does fifty percent of its military spending, then the persuasive powers of that country are on the decline," says Prince Nasir (Alexander Siddig), passed over for an unnamed emirship because his younger brother is friendlier to the interests of the United States. Those competing interests are laid bare as we meet Bob Barnes (George Clooney), a U.S. spook who winds up paying for faulty intelligence with his fingernails; Bryan Woodman (Matt Damon), an energy analyst for whom money won't ease the pain of a son's death; and Bennett Holiday (Jeffrey Wright), a lawyer who refuses to tell big business what it wants to hear. With its gifted ensemble cast, international locations and myriad plotlines, Syriana is as complex as the Byzantine world it depicts and demands concentrated viewing. The payoff is an increased understanding of the primary forces at work in the world today.
Starring: George Clooney, Matt Damon, Jeffrey Wright, Amanda Peet, Tim Blake Nelson
Directed by: Stephen Gaghan
Director Stephen Gaghan is no stranger to writing about addiction. His screenplays have tackled the drug trade (the excellent Traffic) and white kids buying crack in the hood (the abysmal Havoc). With Syriana, Gaghan delivers his most convincing work yet, detailing how geopolitics, religion and corruption affect the veins through which courses America's number-one addiction: oil. "When a country has five percent of the world's population but does fifty percent of its military spending, then the persuasive powers of that country are on the decline," says Prince Nasir (Alexander Siddig), passed over for an unnamed emirship because his younger brother is friendlier to the interests of the United States. Those competing interests are laid bare as we meet Bob Barnes (George Clooney), a U.S. spook who winds up paying for faulty intelligence with his fingernails; Bryan Woodman (Matt Damon), an energy analyst for whom money won't ease the pain of a son's death; and Bennett Holiday (Jeffrey Wright), a lawyer who refuses to tell big business what it wants to hear. With its gifted ensemble cast, international locations and myriad plotlines, Syriana is as complex as the Byzantine world it depicts and demands concentrated viewing. The payoff is an increased understanding of the primary forces at work in the world today.