I met director and ex-soldier Michael Tucker just before the screening of his documentary about post-war, minor-conflict Iraq. He looked very sombre and said American audiences tend to look at Iraq reporting as entertainment. As somebody who has followed the reporting of the Iraq war quite avidly (and with the advantage of British and international media coverage rather than the more one-sided American broadcasts), I assured him I was very interested to see what his film had to say. Disappointingly, I didn't feel this was very much.
Michael Tucker has known ten people that have been killed in Iraq since he worked there with them. That is no small burden to be carrying. Sadly, I neither knew them, nor do I see any similarity between the U.S. troops in the film and British troops that would enable me to empathise to any great degree. With a couple of exceptions, the young Americans portrayed are not the best of adverts for their country - not for any terrible wrong-doing - simply they remind me of the sort of youths that hang about on street corners, that don't take anything too seriously, but have been give a wage and taught to use a gun. One female soldier and a bespectacled young man seem fairly articulate, but the others fill up much footage with inane jokes, playing guitar, and rapping. This might be quite understandable as a way of letting off steam when faced with daily dangers that most of us cannot even conceive of, but it paints a pretty uninviting picture of the individuals. As liberators, they are far from role models. If the army does them some good (which might be arguable both ways) that does not excuse the impression they create worldwide, of loud mouthed youths that have little interest or understanding of others.
When I tackled Tucker about this after the film, he pointed out that the average age of American troops was quite young - about 20 - as opposed to their British counterparts, who are a bit older and more mature. Gunner Palace is the name of Saddam's former palace, now occupied by American troops and used for general partying. I searched in vain for something that would add to the arguments about the rights and wrongs of the Iraq invasion. Tucker said the general American feeling he encountered was that people supported the troops even if they didn't support the war. When I asked him how this was different in any way to his view, he seemed stumped, said his view kept changing, then he admitted he felt America had bit off more than it could chew. To him, the 'rights and wrongs' were 'obvious'. Really? We must be pretty obtuse in Britain to have been having such a lengthy debate over it in that case. Even with a Masters Degree in ethics I don't find the rights and wrongs of such a complex situation 'obvious'. I have many wonderful friends who are Americans, so I know the ones portrayed in his movie are not completely representative - but they do bolster the image Americans (according to international studies) have abroad of being noisy bullies. Apparently test screenings to army units considered the way Gunner Palace portrays the troops quite fair and representative.
I pressed Tucker on whether there was an over-riding reason why he had chosen to make such a movie (I could think of a number - one might be as a tribute to the soldiers killed and a memorial their families could keep). He said he felt the media didn't cover what being an ordinary soldier in Iraq was like. That's a pretty decent reason and I support his objective in wanting to document it. Gunner Palace does show the day to day life of the squaddies (although the film could easily have been condensed into 15 minutes to show this - at 85m it has a boring monotony, too much rap, elaborate praise of McDonalds and Snapple, and kids joking about for so long that Rumsfeld starts to sound fascinating). But Gunner Palace fails to show the deeper ways those youngsters will have been affected. How far it succeeded in its stated objective is maybe for history to decide - and in the event that history can be bothered, it is to be hoped that there will be more substantial backgrounds than Mr Tucker's film alone provides. But seeing as both Americans and Iraqis have lost so much in the war it is good that responses from those countries have been appreciative.
Apparently bootleg copies are freely available on the streets of Iraq.
Michael Tucker has known ten people that have been killed in Iraq since he worked there with them. That is no small burden to be carrying. Sadly, I neither knew them, nor do I see any similarity between the U.S. troops in the film and British troops that would enable me to empathise to any great degree. With a couple of exceptions, the young Americans portrayed are not the best of adverts for their country - not for any terrible wrong-doing - simply they remind me of the sort of youths that hang about on street corners, that don't take anything too seriously, but have been give a wage and taught to use a gun. One female soldier and a bespectacled young man seem fairly articulate, but the others fill up much footage with inane jokes, playing guitar, and rapping. This might be quite understandable as a way of letting off steam when faced with daily dangers that most of us cannot even conceive of, but it paints a pretty uninviting picture of the individuals. As liberators, they are far from role models. If the army does them some good (which might be arguable both ways) that does not excuse the impression they create worldwide, of loud mouthed youths that have little interest or understanding of others.
When I tackled Tucker about this after the film, he pointed out that the average age of American troops was quite young - about 20 - as opposed to their British counterparts, who are a bit older and more mature. Gunner Palace is the name of Saddam's former palace, now occupied by American troops and used for general partying. I searched in vain for something that would add to the arguments about the rights and wrongs of the Iraq invasion. Tucker said the general American feeling he encountered was that people supported the troops even if they didn't support the war. When I asked him how this was different in any way to his view, he seemed stumped, said his view kept changing, then he admitted he felt America had bit off more than it could chew. To him, the 'rights and wrongs' were 'obvious'. Really? We must be pretty obtuse in Britain to have been having such a lengthy debate over it in that case. Even with a Masters Degree in ethics I don't find the rights and wrongs of such a complex situation 'obvious'. I have many wonderful friends who are Americans, so I know the ones portrayed in his movie are not completely representative - but they do bolster the image Americans (according to international studies) have abroad of being noisy bullies. Apparently test screenings to army units considered the way Gunner Palace portrays the troops quite fair and representative.
I pressed Tucker on whether there was an over-riding reason why he had chosen to make such a movie (I could think of a number - one might be as a tribute to the soldiers killed and a memorial their families could keep). He said he felt the media didn't cover what being an ordinary soldier in Iraq was like. That's a pretty decent reason and I support his objective in wanting to document it. Gunner Palace does show the day to day life of the squaddies (although the film could easily have been condensed into 15 minutes to show this - at 85m it has a boring monotony, too much rap, elaborate praise of McDonalds and Snapple, and kids joking about for so long that Rumsfeld starts to sound fascinating). But Gunner Palace fails to show the deeper ways those youngsters will have been affected. How far it succeeded in its stated objective is maybe for history to decide - and in the event that history can be bothered, it is to be hoped that there will be more substantial backgrounds than Mr Tucker's film alone provides. But seeing as both Americans and Iraqis have lost so much in the war it is good that responses from those countries have been appreciative.
Apparently bootleg copies are freely available on the streets of Iraq.