Directed by: Steven Silver
Cast/Starring:
Ryan Phillippe … Greg Marinovich
Malin Akerman … Robin Comley
Taylor Kitsch … Kevin Carter
Patrick Lyster … James Natchwey
Distributed by: Tribeca Films
MPAA Rating: Not available yet
Genres: Drama War
Movie Release Date :April 22, 2011
The Bang Bang Club Movie Summary :
Ryan Phillippe plays real-life combat photojournalist Greg Marinovich. As a member of a gang of photographers, Marinovich finds himself competiting with his colleagues to get the best shot of the bloody action that surrounds them daily.
These wartime paparazzi are based in the South African town of Soweto in the mid-90s. Very little is explained about the politics of the conflict they are covering. They just follow the bloodshed the way Hollywood paparazzi follow Lindsay Lohan.
Their photos are then sold to the photo editor of a Johannesburg newspaper played by Malin Akerman. Almost as an obligitory element to the film, Akerman and Phillippe develop a romantic relationship that leads absolutely nowhere. Akerman’s British accent is so bad that it makes Madonna sound positively royal by comparison!
There are some good moments involving one of the photographers who went on to win a Pulitzer Prize for his classic shot of a vulture stalking a starving African girl. The movie shows us how he came to get the shot, and also debates the issues about why he didn’t simply help the girl instead of just standing on the sidelines to document it. That subplot could fuel an entire movie. Here it’s just a very small piece in a messy little puzzle of a film that never quite explodes the way it wants to.
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