This extraordinary documentary opened to large, enthusiastic audiences in New York City in early July 2008, and then saw its crowds fall off -- and all for a good reason. The trailer led audiences to expect a Michael Moore-type snarky look at the two weeks that troops scheduled for deployment to Iraq spend at the National Training Center in the Mojave Desert, acting out a mission to secure an Iraqi village. What we get instead is a surprisingly thoughtful and even-handed look at the purposes of the training, the motivations of the Army and the soldiers, and the expatriate Iraqis who participate in making Medina Wasl "real." And that's not a simple message to present, as the filmmakers constantly remind us -- yes, there are lots of comical and ironic moments, especially as we go behind the scenes to watch those in charge prepare the simulation; a lot of what we see there, involving the soldiers and the civilian participants, is downright surreal, and there are moments where they could have used someone like Lee Strasberg or Sanford Meisner to coach the players. But the larger questions, of life and death, keep weighing on what we see even amid the play-acting-with-a-purpose, and some of the individual stories help bridge the gap between the smaller comic moments and the larger serious ones -- a young Iraqi participant, who entered the United States illegally and is facing deportation (and almost certain death if he goes back to Bagdad); an older man, accustomed to playing the deputy mayor of Medina Wasl, expresses profound longing to see his country again; and one young woman helps another prepare for her U.S. citizenship test, both expressing ideas and aspirations that could result in their imprisonment or death in many parts of the Middle East that they're trying to save at Medina Wasl.
The movie's mix of humor and seriousness is a lot for audiences to take in an era in which Michael Moore sets the bar for depth and complexity, and the compassion for the troops that we see is genuine, sufficient to repulse some anti-military types who might attend a movie like this for a cheap laugh at the expense of George W. Bush. He does show up in the movie for all of about a minute or so, acting like a fool but doing so completely in context. That might be the most striking element of an overall superb picture -- its fairness. Full Battle Rattle gives time for a lot of points-of-view on the Iraqi War to be heard, with a huge range of often touching humanity (even in some silly moments) on display. It does leave it to viewers to sort out how they feel and where they come down on the subject, but it gives us every opportunity to see the sides of humanity at play on this side of the war effort.