"Lions for Lambs"

But the didacticism of "Lions for Lambs" is so straightforward that it's almost audacious. Redford -- whose last movie was "The Legend of Bagger Vance," in 2000 -- has dared to make a movie that's pretty much just talking. In fact, the movie goes astray when he tries to get too fancy: It's overkill when we see American flags, and the mournfully tidy white tombstones of Arlington Cemetery, reflected in a car window as the character inside ponders numerous doubts and failings. And when Redford's professor Malley tells Hayes, in fiery tones, "Rome is burning, son! ... The problem is us, all of us," I shrank in my seat. No screenwriter should ever write lines like that for an actor, and barring that, no director should ever ask an actor to utter them. But here we have Redford directing himself, and he simply seems not to know better.

That's the sort of clumsiness you have to put up with in "Lions for Lambs," but it's not enough to disperse the picture's intensity. The movie may use a lot of words, but it doesn't mince them, and its very directness is a relief. It's all well and good for Jake Gyllenhaal, in "Rendition," to look pained as he watches an innocent man being tortured -- but he'd damn well better look pained, hadn't he?

So many of the current crop of topical movies tiptoe up to an ultimate revelation that could be summed up as "We're in a complicated situation" or "America is in crisis." Both of which are, of course, much more acceptable revelations than, say, "Whatever we're doing, God is on our side" -- although, ultimately, they may be just as smug and self-congratulatory, accomplishing nothing. While these other movies do nothing more than stroke our good liberal beliefs, "Lions for Lambs" attempts to claw at that placid surface. Its most arresting moment is a flashback in which Malley describes to Hayes a class project undertaken by two of his former students, a project the young men first presented in the classroom and then took outside it. These students are passionate, bright kids, and the plan they propose (and later put into action) is the pivotal polemic that the movie turns on. Some viewers may scoff at this dramatic device, saying, "No real-life kids would ever do that." Then again, isn't that initial surge of disbelief key to a polemic?

In addition to "Lions for Lambs," Carnahan also wrote "The Kingdom," an action picture set in Saudi Arabia in the aftermath of a terrorist attack. That movie has some flaws: Chief among them, it skirts the question of whether we should be using recent, real-life terrorist attacks as the basis for action movies. But it also has some surprising layers of complexity, and far from being a rah-rah-America exercise, it pretty clearly decries our administration's hubris in the Middle East.

"Lions for Lambs" -- the title refers to the admiration German officers felt for English grunts during World War I, while viewing their commanding officers as cowardly buffoons -- suggests that the flashes of intelligence in "The Kingdom" weren't a fluke. This is a weird movie hybrid, both a tasteful picture and an angry one. It's certainly critical of the media: At one point Sen. Irving jabs at Roth, urging her to think back on the days when her job was to report on real news, rather than just serve corporate interests. He bluntly teases her about one of the network's anchors, wondering aloud if "Summer Hernandez Kowalski" could possibly be a real name.

Later, we get a glimpse of this Summer person delivering a "newscast" about a pop star returning from rehab, or some such. Sure, it's an obvious gag. But do we see any of the major network news shows altering their format and delivery so it's smarter, more probing, more skeptical? (On "Larry King" this week, when Redford was asked if "All the President's Men" had had an effect on journalism, he said, "Apparently not.")

In the face of a news media that "sells" our government to us instead of urging us to question it, a blunt little picture like "Lions for Lambs" isn't such a bad thing. Redford and Carnahan clearly intend it as a call to arms, which explains why the movie sometimes feels like a civics lesson, albeit one given by a moderately entertaining instructor. Still -- like a good civics lesson -- the picture adamantly spins out questions rather than answers. Its characters take action for reasons that belong to themselves. We may not like their reasons or approve of their actions, but we can't deny that they've met the challenge of citizenship in a way they've mapped out for themselves.

"Lions for Lambs" doesn't for a minute treat good citizenship as an easy or certain enterprise. It's easy to live up to diminished ideals; the hard part is rising to the lofty ones. Thanks to the imperfections of democracy, we'll never be able to live in the perfect country of our dreams. That's all the more reason to act like citizens of it.

Story finder (3 ways to search Salon)

Search terms:

Salon the Web

Salon Directory (browse by topic)