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List Price: $14.98 | | Label: New Line Home Video
Salesrank: 6195
Released: February 19, 2008 |
| Our Price: $0.68 |
| Used Price: $0.01 |
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MPAA Rating: R (Restricted)
Media: DVD |
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Editorial Review:
Reese Witherspoon, Jake Gyllenhaal and Meryl Streep star in this nail- biting thriller about a man who mysteriously disappears on a flight from South Africa to Washington DC and the government conspiracy put in place to cover it up.
Description of Rendition:
Roger Ebert called it "perfect," and certainly the timing couldn't have been much better: Rendition was released just as the U.S. was debating anew the issue of "extraordinary rendition," a policy (begun under the Clinton administration, accelerated after September 11, 2001) of handing over suspected terrorists to countries that use torture as an interrogation tool. Alas, the movie only rarely fills in the outlines of a prototypical "issue movie," the kind of thing peopled by cardboard characters tracing the patterns of an important, indeed urgent, subject. The plot kicks into gear when an Egyptian-born man (Omar Metwally) is sent to an unnamed North African country where torture is practiced, with the CIA in approval. The film takes a Crash dive through how this affects various people: his pregnant American wife (Reese Witherspoon), the reluctant CIA agent (Jake Gyllenhaal) on the scene, a severe interrogator (Yigal Naor), all the way up to a U.S. terrorism honcho (Meryl Streep) willing to turn a blind eye to the unpleasantness if it stops a terrorist attack. Things spark briefly when Witherspoon enlists an old beau (Peter Sarsgaard) to plead her case with his boss, a U.S. Senator (Alan Arkin), but for the most part director Gavin Hood (Totsi) can't find a way to color in these line drawings, despite the formidable actors doing spirited work. The issue is fully and lucidly explained, but the movie doesn't come alive. --Robert Horton
Rendition Reviews:
A mediocre movie about an important topic 
2009-11-02 - Extraordinary rendition as a tool in the war on terror and its implications for due process and the rule of law, the issue of torture, and the fundamental problem of individual rights versus public safety are all serious and important topics that deserve a better treatment than this movie. Actually, the brief documentary about rendition cases which accompanies the movie on the DVD does a much better job than the movie itself in addressing these issues.
The cast represents considerable talent, and the acting is just fine. The problem is with the writing. This would've been a much better movie if it had focused on the rendition case itself; instead, that almost becomes a sideshow in the drama of the subplot involving the interrogator's daughter and her boyfriend. It is understandable that the writer felt the necessity to include a real terrorist plot alongside the extraordinary rendition and torture in order not to be accused of being completely one-sided, but this dilutes the impact of the rendition story. And in the end, the rendition plot is "solved" in a very unsophisticated manner. So while being mildly entertaining, this film was a disappointment overall.
interesting but leaves an open end 
2009-09-24 - I film was interesting, but one thing that was never answered is
if the phone calls were made to Ibrahimi's cell then what?
They traced him by looking at the terrorist's phone records. Are we to believe
then that it was somebody's cell phone other than Ibrahimi's?
That is the only part that made no sense.
I also was not impressed by 'Douglas'. He was too wishy washy IMO.
Granted he was a bean counter but............
Basically, it says once again that in war, whether combat or
covert, nobody wins.
Message Movie 
2009-06-11 - Quite a good message movie.
The message, quite clearly, is: When you torture (suspected) terrorists, you become a terrorist yourself, and perpetuate the vicious cycle.
This happens to the police official. While torturing the (presumably) innocent Egyptian/American, he also rounds up and tortures the brother of Khalid, which pushes Khalid into suicide-bombing--and that kills Khalid's girlfriend, the police official's daughter.
The CIA officer (Jake Gyllenhaal) sums it up: When you torture (and often kill) one terrorist, you create hundreds more.
The goal of terrorists is to make you act as badly as they say you do. When you do, you prove their point and swell their numbers.
A secondary message: besides being immoral and counterproductive, torture produces no useful info.
Good acting, interesting editing, wonderful photography, a lot of intensity and suitable horror.
Good film.
Terrible! 
2009-05-29 - Pitiful left-wing Hollywood propaganda film that ignores the harsh reality of the ongoing terrorist jihad against the West and especially against the United States.
A Picture You Won't Want to Miss and Won't Want to Watch
2009-05-28 - "Rendition" is two stories that converge at the climax. The first is of a legal alien, chemical engineer, married to an American citizen. The second is a police official from a North African nation who's independent-minded daughter has not been home for seven days. He wants her to return and prepare for the marriage he has arranged.
Anwar El-Ibrahimi, played by Omar Metwally is abducted as he lands in Washington D. C. where his name is erased from the passenger manifest. He is hooded, isolated, questioned, and not allowed to make contact with anyone. The order to have him abducted has already been given by a government official, Corrine Whitman who is played by Meryl Streep. She plays the part of an arrogant, calculating, you-know-what. As a government director she is confident, and wields her power without remorse.
Reese Witherspoon is the wife of Anwar El-Ibrahimi. While the airline denies that he is a passenger, she discovers that he was checked in on the flight from Johannesburg, and used his credit card for duty-free purchases on the flight home, but there is no husband at arrivals.
The decision is made to take Ibrahimi to an unnamed North African nation for rendition. Here we get to see how he is stripped, racked, confined, shackled, and water boarded. A C.I.A. analyst (Jake Gyllenhaall) watches as he is the default person in place, after a public square explosion hours earlier killed his colleague. The bomb was the second attempt on the official's life.
This story is not about anyone in particular, but it does bear a resemblance to the Canadian citizen who was abducted by Americans with the complicity of the head of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police who eventually resigned in disgrace. This also represents what has been going on here in the land of the free, and this is the most frightening part for me as I am a life-long believer that Americans would never tolerate such a policy but would rebel against it. The story spells out clearly that rendition was started in the Clinton administration in one of his bids to move more to the center or right to please conservatives who would never accept him anyway. The movie also makes clear that 9/11 especially in the hands of a President who believed he could do no wrong or a Vice President who didn't care if he did or didn't, would use rendition so often.
Without telling you the remainder of the storyline, the one thing "Rendition" lacked for me was suspense. Only one part of the ending came as a surprise, and I have already alluded to that two times in this review. Part of the end was farfetched and divorced from reality, even if it did somewhat satisfy my sense of justice and retribution. The cast and casting were superb, but the music, unfortunately sounded like it was borrowed from "Gladiator" and "Troy." It must be a very popular style lately.
The DVD also includes special features. These are "Outlawed" documentary which is excellent for only twenty plus minutes, "Intersections: the Making of Rendition" Documentary, five deleted scenes including an alternate ending, and director commentary.
After World War II, the American army forced the local German civilians to view the corpses in over 100 death camps they "never knew" existed. The purpose was to ensure that the Germans could never deny what happened. Seventy years later, it is time for Americans to do the same by watching this picture as a start to learn all about the torture we have committed and caused in the name of security or even freedom, while claiming to be a nation governed by the rule of law.
You won't want to miss this, but you won't want to watch it either.
