Camp X-Ray raises quite a few fascinating questions about power, sexism, and war, yet fails to explore them in any real depth. More troubling still, it's a character study that does little in the way of character development.
Overview
A young woman joins the military to be part of something bigger than herself and her small-town roots. Instead, she ends up as a new guard at Guantanamo Bay, where her mission is far from black and white. Surrounded by hostile jihadists and aggressive squadmates, she strikes up an unusual friendship with one of the detainees.
Director and cast
Critics on Rotten Tomatoes
Top critics, in their words
It's invigorated, somewhat, by strong central performances from actors on opposite sides of a locked steel door.
Writer-director Peter Sattler... grounds his story in the cold operational detail of Gitmo, showing how the soldiers there administer the legal limbo of indefinite detention and insulate themselves from the cruelty and injustice of what they're doing.
On another movie, the high-corn finale might have worked; here, it just feels patently false.
Has a great idea behind it - a young female soldier assigned guard duty at Guantanamo Bay forms a kinship with one of the incarcerated Muslims - but first-time writer-director Peter Sattler doesn't go anywhere interesting with that notion.
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