Only the dead have seen the end of war movies

Take note, aspiring filmmakers. Take note. This is a film that turns the sickening slow-burn of modern combat, waged from miles away with a sniper rifle or a remote detonator, into one of the tensest, most exciting action pictures of the summer. This is a film that does something I'd essentially given up on seeing: having a soldier character in active duty be a fascinating and original human being, but not be an avatar for soldiers the world over.

Newcomer Jeremy Renner gets the honor of playing this exceptionally well-written role, and he manages a simple yet difficult feet: I can't imagine anyone else in the role. Already. Isn't this supposed to take years and years? Aren't I supposed to be able to picture Colin Farrell in the role if someone tells me that Colin Farrell was originally going to play that role? I can't imagine anyone but Brando in the Godfather because he's so well-established in that role, not because Laurence Olivier couldn't have been just as good.

As is standard operating procedure, I'm far ahead of myself and have to shove a plot synopsis somewhere in this behemoth of a block of text.

Jeremy Renner is Staff Sft. William James, a bomb dismantler assigned to Bravo Company's Bomb Disposal Unit a few weeks before he's due to leave Iraq. There, the members of Bravo Company begin to wonder how mentally stable James is.

There's something strange about the ground Renner finds between the way an over-confident human being would act and the way an overconfident soldier would act that makes him seem a touch otherworldly, and it gives you the feeling, far ahead of where the script demands it, that he doesn't exactly belong in either world and he has his own strange reasons to be fighting this war.

What Renner accomplishes with this role is nothing short of awe-inspiring. At this moment, he's my choice for Best Actor. I could have liked another performance better, but at this point I'm blinded by my debilitating crush on Jeremy Renner.

While we're on the subject, let's talk Kathryn Bigelow. I know what you're saying. "A woman not only found her way out of the house, but to Jordan? Better not let the civil rights movement find out about this one!", but hear me out. She deserves a Best Director nomination. What a strange feeling it is to be so worked over by the tension of a film that you feel sick. Every second of her scenarios is perfectly paced and edited, building up to the final confrontation and then executed with a whisper, then a bang.

There's a whole group of extended cameos that are well-served to the film, oddly enough, with Ralph Fiennes especially showing up in the middle of the film as a mercenary contractor who seems to be as unstable as Sgt. James.

This is the first great film about the Iraq War. It's the first film that has made serious commentary about the nature of war and the strange tolls it can take on the men who fight them blah blah blah.

If I have any SERIOUS complaints, it's the very last scene is absolutely unnecessary and completely undercuts the tone the film has spent so long building up.

Kathryn Bigelow has never done anything before to make me think she was capable of shepherding a film of such quality through development, and it almost gives me faith in women as a whole.

9/10