Iraq in Fragments

This highly-personal documentary by James Longley comes with multiple Sundance awards plus an Oscar nomination, and is well worth seeing if you can take the pain of witnessing our misguided war from the other side. Working virtually by himself from start to finish, except for translators and other support staff, Longley creates a film that is brave and revelatory, but also aestheticized and, well, fragmentary. The arty compositions, editing gimmicks, and tricky sound design somehow work against the patent authenticity of the endeavor. Maybe the jump cuts, slo-mo, and MTV editing were required to make the on-the-fly shooting work, but they seem distracting. Longley achieved amazing access both before and after the war, something impossible to duplicate now in the spiraling chaos, and fashions three segments: about a Sunni boy in Baghdad who is essentially an indentured servant to a bullying mechanic, about Shia insurgency in “Sadr’s South”, and a relatively pastoral view of the Kurdish north. Though only an occasional tank or humvee appears in passing in this Iraqi eye view, what holds all three episodes together is resentment of the American occupier. There have been plenty of journalists embedded with American troops, but it take a James Longley to witness a self-flagellation ritual by Moqtada supporters or go on a Mahdi Army action against vendors of alcohol in a local bazaar. (2006, dvd, n.) *7* (MC-84.)