Portal de Periódicos da CAPES

Taking Chance

2009; Oxford University Press; Volume: 96; Issue: 1 Linguagem: Inglês

10.2307/27694904

1945-2314

Robert Eberwein, Ross Katz, Lori Keith Douglas,

Cinema and Media Studies

First-time director Ross Katz's hbo-produced film Taking Chance premiered at the 2009 Sundance Film Festival in January, went directly to hbo in February, and will have to rely on dvd sales and rentals for the wider audience it deserves. At least it has been spared the dismal box-office fates accorded other worthy Iraq War films such as In the Valley of Elah (2007) and Grace Is Gone (2007). Kevin Bacon plays Marine Corps Lt. Col. Mike Strobl, who, with Katz, wrote the script based on his memoir of serving as a military escort for the body of Pfc. Chance Phelps, who was killed in Iraq on Good Friday, 2004. On his way to Phelps's home in Wyoming, Strobl encounters a range of civilians and military personnel, all of them quietly respectful, even reverent, about the young man's death. The film takes no strident position on the Iraq War. The most pointed comment comes from a young man who tells Strobl he is not sure about what the United States is doing over there.