The Hunting Party (R, 2007)

You've heard, of course, that war is hell. But in THE HUNTING PARTY, when Duck (Terrence Howard) says that "war has its bright side as well," he speaks with the sort of authority that comes with experience. "Being that close to death," he says, "being that alive, it's addictive." The movie opens on a Somalian war zone: Amid explosions and small arms fire, Duck, a cameraman, scampers with his TV reporter partner, Simon Hunt (Richard Gere). Duck admires Simon's unflappable world-weariness, and, even more, his commitment to show "truth." When Simon loses that desire and has a meltdown on camera, Duck moves on to a new job and Simon fades away, drinking his way from one war to the next, hoping to make it back into the business he loves. They meet again in Bosnia, a decade after the war. Duck is accompanied by a youngster in need of knowledge: the network VP's son, Benjamin (Jesse Eisenberg). All three proceed to embark on an adventure, pursuing an interview with notorious Bosnian war criminal "the Fox" (Ljubomir Kerekes). Mysterious locals offer warnings, ill-equipped cops avoid engagements, and U.N. monitors declare their inability to do anything, according to their gunless mandate. Through it all, the reporters find themselves, as their mutual bonds and faith in justice build.

Inspired by a 2000 Esquire magazine article by Scott Anderson, Richard Shepard's The Hunting Party begins with a snarky caution against believing what you see -- "Only the most ridiculous parts of this story are true" – yet it generally distrusts viewers to keep up without prodding at every turn. While you could argue that sentimentalizing Simon's original breakdown (it has to do with a lost romance, in brutal fashion) makes a case for his core morality, the effect is to cheapen his investment in what he's calling "truth." The Fox's story is personal for Simon, and so the film loses sight of the context it would seem to care so much about -- the Fox's victims, the Bosnian Muslims and Croats who were raped, tortured, dismembered, and killed.

The story of the Fox -- which indicts international wheelers and dealers who profit from such a man's evasion of "justice," as well as the world leaders who benefit from his fearsome legend -- is obviously meant to suggest both Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic and Osama Bin Laden. More than once, The Hunting Party raises the specter of Chuck Norris as an example of the cartoonish embodiment of revenge and heroism. Such plots and heroes surely need satirizing, especially as they continue to inform political and military endeavors. Still, The Hunting Party plays smug, ensuring that it misses a range of deserving targets while picking off the easy ones.

Studio: Weinstein Co.
Director: Richard Shepard
Cast: Jesse Eisenberg, Richard Gere, Terrence Howard
Genre: Drama
Run time: 103 minutes
Theatrical release: September 20, 2007
DVD release: January 22, 2008
MPAA Rating: R
MPAA explanation: strong language and some violent content.