The Kingdom (2007)
Universal DVD (region 1, 2, 4)
d. Peter Berg; pr. Michael Mann, Scott Stuber; scr. Matthew Michael Carnahan; ph. Mauro Fiore; m. Danny Elfman; ed. Colby Parker Jr., Kevin Stitt; cast. Jamie Foxx. Jennifer Garner, Chris Cooper, Jason Bateman, Ashraf Barhoum, Ali Suliman, Jeremy Piven (110 mins)
The co-dependence of America and Saudi Arabia since the 1933 Aramco discovery of oil is the historical context informing The Kingdom. However, The Kingdom begins with a re-cap of 9-11 in terms of Bin Laden’s antagonism to the Saudi Royal Family who expelled him and the fact that the majority of the 9-11 hijackers were Saudi nationals. It is the context of post 9-11 co-dependence between the two nations due to their mutual interest in an oil-driven economy that informs this story of a combined mass shooting and suicide bombing in the Al Rahmah compound in Riyadh, with the death of any US citizen on foreign soil being the domain of the FBI. Hence, a special team is assembled to investigate, led by Jamie Foxx, but need permission from the Saudi Royal Family to set foot on Arab lands to do so.
Extreme Wahhabist hatred of the USA runs counter to the policies of the Saudi Royal Family, resulting in a cultural division within Saudi society and reflected in the situation of a Saudi investigator (Ashraf Barhoum). When he is assigned to accompany and assist US federal investigators in their search for clues following the suicide bombing, Barhoum is regarded by others in the same police force as helping the enemy. His loyalty to his culture and his religion is called into question and he must wonder whether or not he is prepared to die in the course of helping the Americans, His death – at the hands of those “terrorists” and terrorist-sympathizers who would consider him a traitor – is a very real possibility and The Kingdom is just as much about the cultural sensitivity faced by those who co-operate with the Americans in the Holy Land as it is about the procedural investigative details. And just as the film contrasts Barhoum’s quiet family prayers with the inflammatory Allah-uh-Akhbar rhetoric of the terrorists, so too The Kingdom finally examines the cost that some in the Islamic world must pay for their co-operation with the Americans, a cost that the majority of Americans do not even consider.
In Barhoum’s predicament lies an assessment of the Saudi situation regarding terrorism perpetrated specifically by Saudis against the USA. Such terror, the film suggests, is al Qaeda’s post 9-11 strategy – sending killers into Muslim lands to spread a “join us or die” campaign of terror to galvanize Muslims, who already consider such terrorists as folk heroes akin to Robin Hood. Barhoum considers the means of terrorism abhorrent and, despite the cultural and religious contexts that mitigate his consideration, believes that terrorists are murderers who must be hunted down like any criminal. He is thus able to put aside religious feelings in order to assist the Americans as that is his duty as a criminal investigator. Cause and method are clearly delineated in this film’s conception of terrorism, and it is this that dominates The Kingdom, making it the most involving and balanced look at the cultural issues surrounding specifically Saudi terrorism yet in post 9-11 cinema. Indeed, in its attention to the issues faced by the Islamic world in responding to terrorism, the film joins both The Hamburg Cell and Infinite Justice (both non-US productions) in seeking to explore the issue as far more complex than the simplistic “with us or against us” doctrine of US foreign policy during the Bush administration’s War on Terror.
Regarding a possible terrorist attack against Americans in Saudi Arabia, the film also explores the dilemma faced by the Saudi Royal Family. The Saudis cannot allow a full US investigation for matters of cultural and religious sensitivity, but if they appear to be losing control to the terrorist faction they face the prospect of losing control of their oil-driven economy. The Americans on their part expect that any and all co-operation must be forthcoming in the War on Terror, a theme also echoed in Body of Lies. American arrogance in expecting such co-operation to be fully forthcoming reflects a cultural superiority that this film calls into question. Ironically, US acquiescence to Saudi cultural needs is primarily due to what this film establishes as an oil-dependent economy. Hence, anti-US terrorism in Saudi Arabia specifically in The Kingdom is both about the religious issue of the infidel presence in the Islamic sacred lands, which is the catch-cry uniting the terrorists, and the ramifications of such religious-based terrorism on the global de-stabilization of the all-important oil economy, to which the USA is most vulnerable in its foreign policy in the Middle East.
Ironically, however, it is religious sensitivity which prevents the USA sending in more troops and investigators even when a situation demands it, the US presence in Saudi Arabia being the explosive and divisive issue. Correspondingly, customary American determination, forensic expertise and even “arrogance” must be tempered with extreme sensitivity to the local culture and the politically precarious situation. For instance, buxom investigator Jennifer Garner, who dresses in tight tops, must cover her bosom completely when in the presence of the Saudi Prince. Likewise Garner, as an infidel female, is not allowed to touch a dead male Muslim body and must instruct her aide on the proper means of getting fingerprints. The Saudi Royal Family on their part cannot afford any more bad press in the US media, being implicated indirectly in the material support of terrorism due to the laundering of funds to terrorists direct from Saudi charities. Thus, the investigation of the suicide bombing is announced as a joint US-Saudi co-operative venture. Although the US have no authority to arrest, they are allowed under armed escort onto Arab lands to conduct their investigation. Correspondingly, the Saudi Royals must put pressure on policeman escort Barhoum to keep the Americans safe.
The details of the investigation are gripping, as the trail leads to former bomb-makers (a profession the members of which can be determined by examining their hands for missing fingers – an occupational hazard). Interestingly enough, The Kingdom also raises a theme that haunts the post 9-11 cinema of terrorism – the ethics of torture: here, the Saudis can torture suspects to get information and ethical considerations are secondary to the imperative to collect vital information. This is precisely the rhetoric that Bush’s Vice-President Dick Cheney used to validate torture and make a mockery of the US ideal of democracy according to the documentary makers of Taxi to the Dark Side and informs the fictional ruminations of both Rendition and Extraordinary Rendition. Likewise, Body of Lies sought to dramatize the role of torture in Islamic lands as opposed to American soil, the collusion between such being the central point in Rendition.
Interview with Ashraf Barhoum
Evolving in the terrorist genre post 9-11 is the suicide bombing set-piece, examined from multiple points of view in Vantage Point and here shown with a terrifying immediacy that emphasizes the exhilaration of terror inherent in the suicide bombing. The Kingdom quickly establishes a precarious US presence in Saudi Arabia – the reality of being watched by terrorists intent to kill soldier and civilian, women and children: the resentment of the US in the region and the cultural sensitivity this demands of troops, politicians and, in this context, special investigators. In its detailed forensic investigation of a suicide bombing, the film neatly combines the procedural nature of such television shows as CSI with the evolving dynamics of the post 9-11 terrorist film to create a unique detective story – the hunt for a terrorist, as explored in part in A Mighty Heart. Likewise, the procedural reality of the bomb-making process is depicted in vivid detail as is, like the films Body of Lies, Infinite Justice and Redacted, the making of a terrorist ritual beheading / execution video.
Barhoum’s situation as the “good Muslim” helping the US investigation distantly recalls Tony Shalhoub’s role in the pre 9-11 film of The Siege. Indeed, Barhoum here is the epitome of reason and rationality in contrast to the terrorists, who emerge as madmen and enemies of reason: the subtext of reason vs. religion also infiltrating the latter stages of Charlie Wilson’s War. With a resolution tellingly questioning the humanity of the will to kill, The Kingdom takes the Islamic terrorist as perverted monster figure from the pre 9-11 cinema of terrorism and re-positions it within a culture in which what is demonized in the West is treated almost as a folk hero in the Middle East. However, whilst the terrorist culprit remains off-screen in this film – an absent signifier of tremendous import – the ambivalence in the depiction of terrorism’s trans-cultural status is a hallmark of post 9-11 cinema and would the following year influence both Body of Lies and Traitor. Indeed, these three films comprise the re-definition of the terrorist thriller as not only an exciting and contemporary genre but the main means in which cinema began to address the ethical and cultural complexities of the War on Terror concealed and suppressed by the Bush government.
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