Edward Zwick tries tapping into current events a bit, obviously hoping that the short-term memory of moviegoers will result in big movie bucks. His new movie "The Siege" brings current headlines onto the big screen, by dealing with the current terrorism scares around the world Unfortunately, after a promising, and big bang start, The Siege turns into a cliched wanna-be political thriller, that becomes too bogged down in own political views. Zwick tries to shock us by showing us obviously disturbing images of martial law, and the imprisonment of Arab-Americans, but unfortunately it glosses over them too much. We are shown brief shots that we have seen before on newscasts in the Middle East, but now the attempted shock value comes from the fact that it is happening here in America. When he runs out of these images, and his plot becomes bogged down and confusing (quite often actually), he just blows stuff up to get our waning attention back. Denzel Washington brings an intensity to his role as a frustrated FBI agent, searching for why sites in the Big Apple keep exploding. Along with his partner Tony Shalhoub, who gives the most memorable performance as the obviously conflicted FBI agent of Arab-American descent, they run around, chase Arabs, and sift through quite a muddled plot. Confusing things further is a mysterious government agent played by a haggard, but emotional Annette Bening. Her character basically fuels the confusion of the plot. Just when we think we have things figured out, she throws in a curve ball, and the audience becomes lost again. So, Zwick just makes more stuff explode. Finally, the Army is brought in, led by a sleepwalking, cardboard Bruce Willis. Now Willis will probably will never be known for his acting ability, but action movies, with a touch of comedy have always been his forte'. He is good in that capacity. Here, he plays it like an angry John McClain on Valium. He growls, he spouts cliched lines, and he never really shows any emotion other than anger. Any number of aged actors who look good in an Army uniform could have played his role. The performance is faceless, similar to that of John Cusack's role in Con-Air.