Gunner Palace

Reviewed by:
Paul Ulane

Say what you will about our current president, but his decision making is certainly pumping plenty of cash into the movie industry. Gunner Palace is the latest documentary to offset the Fox-Eye-View of the War in Iraq, this one centering on the soldiers who've made barracks out of Uday Hussein's bombed-out party pad. Short of a smooth occupation, Palace chronicles street shootouts, fruitless raids, and incompetent Iraqi soldiers-in-training. Interviews with various army personnel span a spectrum of views on the war effort, from vigorous approval to general confusion. When they're not complaining, the bored soldiers are killing time, yielding an endless barrage of freestyling GIs detailing their plight, and more heavily-armed group poses than a G-Unit video. The lack of story—this is really just clips of video spliced together—and melodramatic narration by director Michael Tucker dampen the movie's message, but it beats the hell out of another lecture from Michael Moore.

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