I'm not sure how to describe Three Kings. It's funny, but it's not a comedy. It's exciting, but it's not an action movie. It's political, but it's not a message movie. Instead, the film is some unique hybrid of all these things. On paper, I'm not sure if it would make sense, but as executed by filmmaker David O. Russell, Three Kings is one of the most original and offbeat pictures of the year.
The setting is Iraq, right after the Gulf War has ended. Three U.S. soldiers (George Clooney, Mark Wahlberg, Ice Cube) find a map (in a very strange location) that supposedly shows the location of $23 million dollars in gold, which Saddam Hussein stole from Kuwait. The trio, along with a fourth soldier (video director Spike Jonze), sets out to steal it for themselves. It seems like the perfect Robin Hood crime - taking millions from the evil enemy and giving it to their bad righteous selves.
The heist is easier said than done and along the way, they realize that Iraqi citizens - encouraged to uprise against Hussein's army by George Bush - are being slaughtered by that same army. When the Americans enter a small Iraqi village, the townspeople believe they have come to help. The Iraqi army doesn't see it that way and begins slaughtering innocent people. Although their focus is stealing the gold, Clooney and crew are appalled by the senseless violence before them. Gaining a sudden conscience, the three anti-heroes decide to help liberate a group of Iraqi citizens. The trick is to get them across the border while still snagging the gold before anyone finds out.
Three Kings, as I said, was written and directed by David O. Russell, whose Flirting With Disaster remains one of the most appealingly oddball comedies of the 90's. From the first minute of that film, I knew I was in the hands of a demented genius, a guy with such a unique world view that I'd follow him anywhere he chose to lead me. I got that same feeling from the opening scene of this movie, in which Wahlberg spots an Iraqi soldier holding a white flag atop a dune and asks his follow troops the question "Are we shooting?" The scene kicks off the kind of comic confusion Russell relishes - namely, the kind in which characters don't know what to do and therefore usually do the inappropriate thing.
A Gulf War comedy seems like territory a million miles away from the urban angst of Flirting With Disaster (or his debut incest comedy Spanking the Monkey), but Russell pulls it off. He fuses his bizarre sense of humor with relevant political ideas and throws in some of the most innovative action scenes in recent memory. The filmmaker puts the camera in unexpected places for those scenes, creating a kind of Mad Max-style frenzy. Most importantly, the action, comedy, and politics compliment each other instead of crowding each other out. I can't think of another recent film that juggled so many disparate elements so fluidly.
Even the look of Three Kings is arresting. Russell uses a special kind of film that makes everything look bright but grainy at the same time for a hypnotic effect. There are also some really stylish sequences, such as one in which the camera enters a man's body to show the damage a bullet causes on internal organs, and one in which the camera follows the trajectory of bullets as they are fired in combat. I could never accurately describe the style of the film beyond what I have just said, but suffice it to say that it's worth seeing for yourself.
I was engrossed in the movie from start to finish because it's the kind of picture where you never know what's going to happen next. There are some big laughs, and moments of high excitement. And yet it's got a real brain inside of it, too. All the performers are outstanding, but the real star is Russell, whose vision is groundbreaking and enthralling. I can see that my words have not done this film justice; it's so original and offbeat that no review can properly convey its pleasures. What I can say is this: Three Kings is destined to be on my year-end Ten Best list.
(
out of four)
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