.: ShaolinTiger - Kung-Fu Geekery :.

After a terrorist attack to an American housing compound in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, where families and the spy Francis Manner are murdered, FBI agent Ronald Fleury blackmails the South Arabian consul to get five days of investigation in the location. He travels with agent Grant Sykes, Janet Mayes and Adam Leavitt to revenge their friend and try to find the responsible for the bombing. The agents find all sorts of difficulties in their investigation, but they are supported by Colonel Faris Al Ghazi that advises the team how to act in a hostile environment

I actually thought this was some kind of action movie from the poster, so I didn't watch it for a while as I didn't feel like anything mindless (I never did check it out in IMDB where it has a solid score of 7.2).

The day I happened to put it on however I did, and was surprised to find it's actually a serious movie - somewhat of a political thriller.

Having been to Saudia Arabia before and having spent some time there...it was a little reminiscent, the events in the movie aren't too far from reality.

This movie follows on from a crop of terrorist/middle-eastern themed movies such as Rendition, Vantage Point and A Mighty Heart.

The movie has more action than the others do and is generally faster paced, so it's torn somewhere between being an action movie and a political commentary/thriller.

Jamie Foxx once again shows he's a great actor (but I knew that ever since I saw Ray) holding the lead of Ronald Fleury.

The rest of the cast do a good job with the local police Sergeant Haytham playing an excellent and compelling role.

The action scenes are good and realistic and there are some interesting and scary characters laced through-out the movie.

Of course the bad guys get served in the end..but that's how the Americans wish it always was.

All in all it's a decent movie, it won't win any awards and it's not particularly memorable in dialogue or scenery - but it's worth a watch.

I'd give it a pretty good 6/10.

Syriana is a thriller of corruption and power related to the oil industry that tells four parallel stories: the CIA agent Bob Barnes (George Clooney) with great experience in Middle East that falls in disgrace after an unsuccessful mission dealing missiles in Lebanese Republic; the investigation of the attorney Bennett Holiday (Jeffrey Wright) related to the merge of two American oil companies, Connex and Killen; the traumatic association of the energy analyst Bryan Woodman (Matt Damon) with the son of a powerful emir of Iran; and the social drama of the Pakistani immigrant worker Wasim Khan (Mazhar Munir) that is fired by the oil company.

Well it's a long time since I've done a movie review, so here you are! It's been quite a long time since I watched any movies, so there you go..

I've got a LOT of movies to catch up, so I'll bore you with some of the reviews.

Syriana was one of those big hyped movies from 2005, Oscar nominations, these awards, those awards etc etc. I was expecting a lot from it.

It got a solid 7.2 on IMDB, if not for the boring part it'd easily be a high 8.

Frankly the first 20 mins was a complete yawn-fest, I almost turned it off, I know someone that did fall asleep and someone else that did actually turn if off half way through.

It's a shame as it does get very much better after that.

It's an intricately woven tale showing the picture from the ground level with Pakistani workers being laid off in the oil fields, the political level, and the level of normal people like you and I with George Clooney and Matt Damon getting involved for vastly different reasons.

It's a deeply political film and very nicely linked together but slow in parts, it's definately thinkers film and is closely related to many of the things that have happened in recent times..

I believe it was banned in Malaysia due to some of the sensitive issues it addressed.

The acting was top notch, it's good to see Clooney taking a meaty role and once again Matt Damon showing his versatility.

It's an interesting enough movie, just don't expect any action, chicks, explosions or humour.

Serious and tense it is, light-hearted it is not.

You have to give it some time and get into the plot, the twists, the power struggles and the back-stabbing. It was based on a book which was apparently based on a real conflict, I have yet to look up who the prince was..but it's certainly interesting.

I'd give it a worth watching 6.5/10.