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We’ve raised a generation that understands aggression
but has been trained to lack compassion; that understands
fighting without victory; this all allows us to see the
emotional journey of Marines in one of the most vicious
war zones imaginable—Bagdad. These soldiers like the soldiers
from Vietnam do their job and continue to be professionals
while dealing with the emotional consequences that they
weren’t always well trained to do deal with. The rules of
engagement constantly change forcing this generation of
soldiers to be more flexible something that humans aren’t
always the best at equipped to do. ***
“Generation Kill” the HBO mini-series on the first 40
days of the Iraq war gives us a unique perspective from
the fighting soldier -the grunt in the trenches who must
face the consequences of command decisions and live with
those consequences. An excellent series, “Generation Kill”
gives us a unique perspective on this war which began over
the control of natural resources such as oil and then continued
on, later, under a different administration for exactly
the same reasons. All the while those of us who watch these
brave men and women serve their country are, like them,
questioning the validity of a war waged for economic reasons
all the while being fleeced by those very people in the
Middle East that we are supposedly helping. It’s a fascinating
often compelling, complex and morally unusual study of Americans
under fire for dubious political reasons and driven purely
by the economic machinery of industry. ***
Created by David Brown (“Homicide: Life on the Streets”)
the seven part series was based on the book by journalist
Evan Wright who had first hand experience when he went in
with the first troops during the 2002 engagements in Iraq.
In case you thought you knew the war in Iraq because you
watched all the TV coverage, read the newspaper accounts
but, really, this TV mini-series is the CLOSEST you will
come to experiencing what happened in Iraq, the brave men
and women who fought for us regardless of whether this was
an economic war or not and made the decision to do their
duty and die or live depending on circumstances and their
training. ---
Image & Sound:
Shot on high definition video, “Generation Kill” has
the gritty look one would expect of a show that aims for
a documentary “look” but keeps the quality of the images—clarity
and detail—fairly high. Contrast is often high and the often
washed out colors and tones of the show is to be expected.
The good news is that the producers and HBO chose to keep
the transfer true to the broadcast experience and focused
on maintaining that gritty look without resorting to edge
enhancement or other shortcuts to make this look better
for the crowd brought up to believe that all Blu-rays should
have pretty pictures. ***
Audio sounds extremely good although it lacks the diversity
one would expect from a major theatrical release the TrueHD
soundtrack sounds clear with nice detail and a nice, vivid
dynamic range. ---
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