The War Tapes

Even documentaries program you to expect payoffs. The War Tapes, a powerfully distressing film in which director Deborah Scranton weaves together first-person video footage shot by three National Guardsmen in Iraq in 2004, roughly a year after the invasion began, gives us a literal soldier's-eye view of the current U.S. military nightmare: desolate rides through Baghdad and Fallujah, accompanied by the occasional explosion and always -- always -- the fear that the next IED will be the one that hits you. The soldiers speak movingly of that anxiety. It's almost intrinsic to the nature of movies that we begin to wait for that horrific event, the awful ''climax'' to the soldiers' dread.
thewartapes.com