Susan Granger’s review of “In the Valley of Elah” (Warner Independent)
Academy Award season is officially underway with the release of this hard-hitting drama by Paul Haggis (“Crash”), exploring the emotional wreckage of the current war.
Soon after a young soldier, Mike Deerfield (Jonathan Tucker), returns to Fort Rudd from active duty in Iraq, he’s reported AWOL. When his commanding officer phones his parents (Tommy Lee Jones, Susan Sarandon) in Tennessee, they’re mystified. Hank’s a stoic Vietnam vet but they’ve already lost the eldest son in a helicopter crash. So he drives to the New Mexico base to investigate, dutifully stopping en route to correct a Guatemalan immigrant who is flying the American flag upside down by mistake.
Meanwhile, there’s a jurisdictional skirmish between military police and local detectives over the incinerated remnants of a dismembered body found scattered in a field near the base. Forensic evidence indicates it’s Mike – but recently promoted Det. Emily Sanders (Charlize Theron), a single mother, is baffled by the crime scene, which the Army brass (Jason Patric, James Franco) dismiss as a drug deal-gone-bad. Utilizing his experience as an Army MP, Hank suspiciously interrogates Mike’s clean-cut comrades and hires a techie (Rick Gonzalez) to hack into Mike’s cellphone and retrieve scrambled video footage he took in Iraq, which, eventually, sheds light on what occurred.
Adapted from a Playboy magazine article, “Death and Dishonor” by Mark Boal and elegantly photographed by Roger Deakins, it features one of Tommy Lee Jones’ finest performances as an agonized father questioning long-held beliefs. Charlize Theron, Frances Fisher and Susan Sarandon are convincing, but Sarandon is woefully underutilized. On the Granger Movie Gauge of 1 to 10, “In the Valley of Elah” is a profoundly powerful and disturbing 9, taking its title from the Biblical valley where David fought Goliath.
