Zero Dark Thirty!!!!

Zero Dark Thirty.

When I first heard about Zero Dark Thirty and what the storyline of the film would entail I thought to myself that it couldn't be done, especially in a respectful way and to not cause too much offence. But then I heard about who would direct the film, The Hurt Locker's Kathryn Bigelow and my faith was restored in the film straight away.

The film starts quite shockingly with a pitch black screen and all you hear is the audio of workers in the twin towers speaking to emergency service workers after the first plane hit the north tower. The film then jumps to two years later in a small tinned roof hanger where CIA agent Dan (Jason Clarke) is asking a detainee some questions, it then gets intense as Dan waterboards the detainee to gain valuable information. Looking on and watching the torture is a new recruit in the form of Maya (Jessica Chastain) who has alot to learn while living and working in Pakistan. 

The story follows the main characters of Dan and Maya working as CIA agents in Pakistan with other government agents tasked to try to find out where the location of Osama Bin Laden is and to take him down and stop the threat posed by Al-Qaeda.  

As the film progresses at a steady pace you become totally submerged in the narrative of the film, as the C.I.A team gather information from waterboarding detainees and working on leads to the top men they come across no valuable information. With top bosses coming in and demanding "I want targets and I want them dead" it's a very stark reality that what they are doing is finding out where the top Al-Qaeda men are and taking them  out one by one. The film is mainly aimed at following the long ten year career of Maya so we see all the terrorist attacks around the world in her ten year career on screen and in my opinion handled with such great care and respect. 

As C.I.A agents come and go over the ten years you see that Maya is adamant on finding OBL and taking him down once and for all, stopping at nothing to find him. With torture being dismissed by President Obama via a real interview conducted with the President shown on a TV the team adjusts their tactics. With some leads finally coming up Maya is adamant on working on a courier lead that she believes will lead them to OBL and his whereabouts. Meeting with top official C.I.A Director Leon Panetta (James Galdolfini) Maya and her team must convince him that the third male person in the compound they have found in Pakistan is the wanted Al-Qaeda leader Osama Bin Laden. Soon enough they get the go ahead and a strike force team is setup to fly in by two helicopters, enter the compound, take down OBL and collect as much evidence as possible.

Soon enough your in the helicopter with the special agents about hit the compound and the film shifts gears and slows right down with some of the most intense scenes I've seen this year. Your hands start to sweat and your heart beats really fast as your on the edge of your seat and sucked right into the action. Even though you know what outcome of the film is going to be you become truly immersed in the scenes. 

The film itself in my eyes is a triumph, the storyline of the film shows the meticulous work that goes into evidence gathering and how they follow up possible leads. The use of fast paced scenes for the first three quarters to then juxtapose and slow right down to the last quarter of the film is very well done. With just low light and sound used in the compound scenes it has a simple feel to it and is nothing too overly "hollywood" and feels truly real. Jessica Chastain's character portrayal as Maya is flawless, she starts off as a shy, timid agent straight out of Harvard and transforms into a swearing, confrontational, determined agent who will stop at nothing to take down OBL. The film doesn't dwell on past attacks, it shows them briefly and moves on handling them with the upmost respect. If their was any film this year that I would highly recommend seeing then this would be it as it is a truly amazing cinematic film and well worth a watch.

10/10.