A very interesting Iraqi war piece from director Brian De Palma (Dressed To Kill, Casualties of War, The Untouchables, Carlito’s Way, Mission to Mars etc.) loosely based on the 2006 Mahmudiyah killings in Mahmoudiyah, Iraq, when US Soldiers raped an Iraqi girl and murdered her along with her family.

The film goes to great lengths at its beginning to point out that it is fictitious and that De Palma is not saying this actually happened, just sorta. After all the US Army didn’t prosecute anyone so therefore, it only sorta happened…!

The film uses the now familiar handheld camera perspective with the lead character relating a video diary to his camera.

I didn’t notice that Brian De Palma had directed the film until the closing credits, so didn’t immediately make the connection with Casualties of War. Redacted was a far superior film: it was everything Casualties of War was not (Michael J. Fox frowning his way through two hours or so). The film asked a lot of the questions Western society is asking of just how American troops are acting in these theatres of war and the pressures that drive some of them to atrocities such as this.