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"Infidel" (2020 release; 107 min.) brings the story of Doug Rawlins. As the movie open, we are reminded the film is "inspired by true events". We are in "Tehran, Iran", and a guy is standing in front of 4 armed and masked soldiers, as he is about to be executed. We then go to "Washington, DX, Six Months earlier", and Doug is picking up his wife Liz from the US State Department, where she works. Doug works in a small tech company doing contracts work for the US government, but he is also an active Christian blogger. He is invited to speak in Cairo, Egypt in a widely broadcast interview for the Muslim world. Doug can't help himself and invites Muslims to convert to Christianity, enraging Muslims all over. t's not long before he is abducted... At this point we are 15 min. into the movie but to tell you more of the plot would spoil your viewing experience, you'll just have to see for yourself how it all plays out.
Couple of comments: first, this is the latest film from writer-director Cyrus Nowrasteh, whose "The Stoning of Soraya M" was quite good, but who also has been involved in some dubious other stuff. Second, more troubling, the production company behind this film turns out to be D'Souza Media, the company run by far-right wing activist Dinesh D'Souza, a convicted felon whom Trump pardoned in 2018. (Among other things, D'Souza also claims that the Democrats are racists, and that fascism is a left-wing movement. Yea, we're dealing with that kinda garbage. He is of course very much welcome in the Trump circle.) When I saw that name in the opening credits, my heart sank. Third, the film claims to be "inspired by true events", but never discloses what those true events are. Fourth, the movie is just not very good, period. The script has holes the size of Manhattan. The acting is outright poor (Jim Caviezel who plays Doug figures himself a Ben Affleck). Speaking of Affleck, "Infidel" more than anything wants to be a new "Argo" (hostage drama in Iran), but comes nowhere close to it. I mean, not by a mile or ten.
"Infidel" opened this weekend in theaters (fully adhering to all COVID-19 protocols). The Friday early evening screening where I saw this at here in Cincinnati was attended dismally (2 people, including myself). Honestly I can't see "Infidel" playing in theaters more than 1 or 2 weeks. Of course, I encourage you to seek it out, be it in the theater, on VOD, or eventually on DVD/Blu-ray, and draw your own conclusion.
score 3/10
paul-allaer 18 September 2020
Reprint: https://www.imdb.com/review/rw6106500/ |
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20-9-2020 21:21:07