Kingdom

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Movie Review by Silvia Felce

Starring: Jamie Foxx, Chris Cooper, Jennifer Garner, Jason Bateman, Jeremy Piven
Director: Peter Berg

THE KINGDOM starts quite well, with a quick sequence that shows the history between USA and Saudi Arabia and their involvements with the petroleum industry from the 1930 to the present day. After that we witness a terrible attack by suicide bombers on an American oil company where many American employees live with their families. This assault results in many fatalities, including an FBI agent. Back in America, FBI Special Agent Ronald Flory (Jamie Foxx), who was a friend of the dead agent demands and obtains permission for himself and three other agents – Grant Sykes (Chris Cooper), Adam Leavitt (Jason Bateman) and Janet Mayes (Jennifer Garner) – to go over to Saudi Arabia and investigate who is behind the bombing.

The group is only given five days to accomplish their mission. However once they arrive in Saudi Arabia, their work is made more difficult as everybody is hostile towards them and unwilling to help. They are kept in a basketball court during the night while during the day they have to fight against regulations, suspicion and incompetence. They find a like-minded partner in Saudi Colonel Al Ghazi (Ashraf Barhoum) but the closer they get to solving the case, the more their lives are in danger, as they become targets of the terrorists.

THE KINGDOM benefits from a very good cast, headed by Jamie Foxx who is in top form and some very good action scenes. Unfortunately, it is the script that lets the whole film down. What could have been a very interesting political thriller becomes more of an action movie, a good action movie perhaps, but the premise had promised us something else.

3 out of 6 stars