'The Kingdom' does solid but unremarkable job

Peter Berg’s The Kingdom, which opens today, has received considerable speculation as being perhaps the film that will utilize the backdrop of 9/11 and terrorism and prove both a critical and commercial success. In all likelihood, it’s going to do quite well on the fiscal side. Berg’s cast some big and popular names in key roles such as Jamie Foxx, Jennifer Garner, Jason Bateman and Jeremy Piven, and the locales are often visually stunning, especially the scenes done in the United Arab Emirates.

As a action vehicle, Berg’s incorporated plenty of high speed car chases, explosions, martial arts exchanges, and some truly dazzling, scary fire fight sequences. The lengthy battle that leads to the film’s conclusion also includes Garner’s best hand-to-hand combat scenes since Alias went off the air. Chris Cooper might be the most nuanced and effective actor of the bunch, though it’s clearly Foxx in the spotlight much of the time, with Garner and Bateman also getting plenty of screen time.

The crack FBI unit led by Foxx are enlisted (actually they virtually demand to get the case) to assist Saudi police in discovering who was responsible for two horrific incidents on an American base that get The Kingdom off to a brisk start. The agents soon find themselves battling not just Saudi resistance but diplomatic interference and indifference. But they eventually succeed in getting the access they need to truly work the case, and Foxx forges a union with a Saudi officer (Ashfaf Barham in a tremendous role) who wants to go beyond suspicion and mistrust and find out what happened.

There are some shocking outcomes here, along with some rather expected events. Berg has voiced his disdain for the notion that films should emphasize messages at the cost of storytelling or visual impact, so there’s little exploration here of thorny geopolitical and cultural issues (like the treatment of women in Saudi Arabia for example) or the balancing act between religious fervor and societal changes resulting from oil profits.

Instead, once the team gets on site, everything’s weighed toward solving the crime. Mixing parts of procedural television shows, espionage movies and even martial arts flicks, Peter Berg gives action fans much of what they want in The Kingdom, while displaying the kind of verve with the camera and willingness to utilize shock and effects that’s the blueprint for today’s action epics. Hopefully in some of the four films he’s doing down the line Berg will also put as much focus on character development, subplots and ancillary issues raised in his films.

The Kingdom

Directed by Peter Berg

Starring Jamie Foxx, Jennifer Garner, Chris Cooper, Jason Bateman, Jeremy Piven, Ashraf Barham

Time: 1 hour, 50 minutes

Rating: R

Our view: Solid, but far from inspirational or innovative