Operation Filmmaker (2007)
Average Rating: 7.3/10
Reviews Counted: 31
Fresh: 28 | Rotten: 3
Operation Filmmaker is a darkly funny, ironic tale of a cross-cultural exchange gone wrong.
Average Rating: 7.6/10
Critic Reviews: 15
Fresh: 14 | Rotten: 1
Operation Filmmaker is a darkly funny, ironic tale of a cross-cultural exchange gone wrong.
liked it
Average Rating: 3.7/5
User Ratings: 512
My Rating
Movie Info
Touched by the plight of an aspiring Iraqi filmmaker whose dreams of working in Hollywood seemed to fall with Baghdad, American filmmaker Liev Schreiber invites the ambitious wannabe director to intern on Everything Is Illuminated, to unexpected results. In 2004, just one year after the United States launched a devastating attack on Baghdad, MTV ran a story about a 25-year-old Iraqi film student named Muthana Mohmed, who remained determined not to let the strife that consumed his country consume
ADVERTISEMENT
All Critics (33) | Top Critics (15) | Fresh (28) | Rotten (3)
If learning about other cultures shows that we're all basically alike, Operation Filmmaker is a reminder that foreign countries have their own share of nitwits, too.
Top CriticWhat might have been a vanity project emerges as a surprisingly complicated morality tale.
Everyone here comes out smelling bad -- that's why the film's so good.
This gut punch of a documentary will knock you for a loop.
An exit strategy in Iraq? This self-aware study shows how hard it'll be.
A ruefully funny cautionary tale about cross-cultural tone-deafness.
Nina Davenport's unapologetically cunning doc exceeds the sum of its parts to become almost unmanageably allegorical and even an indictment of its own shock-and-awe premise.
Particularly fascinating is the way in which it this documentary examines the filmmaker's relationship to the film's subject, and the role documentary filmmakers play in shaping their subjects' futures.
The antagonism between filmmaker and subject reminds us that reality is never a passive still life, but a volatile entity with its own ideas on how it is to be represented.
Davenport focuses deep on the Hollywood do-gooder mentality and her own complicity in treating Mohmed as a symbol of the war and not as a flawed person.
It's fearless filmmaking. And the surprising observations about cultural differences and insights into the movie production process make the whole thing worthwhile.
Veteran documentary filmmaker Nina Davenport parses an ill-conceived experiment in cross-cultural understanding that began with the best intentions.
The whole film could be seen a metaphor for America's misadventures in Iraq: Schreiber and company came in expecting flowers and sweets from a grateful native, and wound up in a quagmire.
As the story of an exasperating, manipulative, lazy and entitled young man, it's one for the books.
Audience Reviews for Operation Filmmaker
Super Reviewer
here is my mail ( cynthiajohn3j@yahoo.com.sg ) then i will send you my picture and also tell you more about my self have a nice-day thinks
Discussion Forum
There are no discussion threads for Operation Filmmaker yet.
What's Hot On RT
Trailer for James Franco adaptation
Star Trek is Certified Fresh
Rachel McAdams' time travel romantic drama
Trailer for Tom Hanks thriller
Featured on RT
- Weekly Ketchup: Will Smith to Star in Wild Bunch Remake? 33
- Critics Consensus: Star Trek Into Darkness is Certified Fresh 89
- Red Carpet Roundup: Star Trek Into Darkness Edition 0
- Video Interviews with Katie Aselton & Lake Bell of Black Rock 2
- VIP Access: Eli Roth talks Aftershock 1
- Total Recall: Star Trek Movies 93
- Parental Guidance: Star Trek Into Darkness 18
Top Headlines
-
J.J. Abrams Talks Star Trek Into Darkness, Star Wars, and More
0
-
Vin Diesel Says Fast & Furious 7 Will Begin a New Trilogy
7
-
Mickey Rourke Confirmed for Expendables 3
3
-
Brad Bird Still Mulling Incredibles 2
0
-
Reese Witherspoon, Jena Malone, and Martin Short Join Inherent Vice
0
-
Bruce Willis Makes an Expiration Date
2
-
Drew Pearce Hired for Mission: Impossible 5
0
Fresh Links
Featured
Star Trek Movies Ranked
HitFix offers their own take on the worst-to-best of the Enterprise crew's cinematic adventures.
Top 10 Star Trek Villains
Rolling Stone unveils the Enterprise's most irksome adversaries.
Celebrity Yearkbook Flashback
We'll bet you never realized how many stars were cheerleaders and high school athletes!
50 Most Classic Movie Moms
In celebration of Mother's Day, TimeOut offers up 50 iconic matriarchs from the big screen.
Weirdest Movie Siblings
From Twins to The Royal Tenenbaums, Moviefone explores cinema's oddest siblings.
Promos
Follow RT on Twitter!
Spice up your feed with hourly Tomatometer updates!
