Stop-Loss

Five years ago, the United States invaded Iraq. Five years later, the United States is still there, the violence seemingly getting worse. More than 4,000 soldiers are dead. The war is a major issue in the presidential race, the two Democratic candidates arguing for withdrawal and the presumptive Republican nominee saying we need to stay and not so easily admit defeat.

In her new movie, Stop-Loss, Kimberly Pierce, best known for her 1999 film Boys Don't Cry, goes beyond the rhetoric by focusing on the soldiers, their pain and struggles, the cost they pay for fighting a seemingly endless war.

In the film, Ryan Phillipe plays Brandon King, a soldier who has already seen two tours in Iraq. This last tour ended with several of his men dead in an ambush. King returns home to Texas, anxious to start a new life and leave the war back in Iraq.

But he can't quite escape. As soon as he's home, he's told he has to go back. King has been stop-lossed, a policy that allows the military to ship back soldiers even if their contract is up. The policy of stop-loss is essentially a back-door draft to make up for the shortage of soldiers.

King is livid. He's served his country long enough. He's seen too many awful things. His buddies are already struggling to adjust to a life that doesn't involve dodging bullets or seeing friends blown up by IEDs.

King decides, against the wishes of his best friend, Steve, played by Channing Tatum, to go AWOL, jumping in the car with Steve's girlfriend, and heading to Washington, D.C.

Along the way, he and his buddies deal with the boiling emotions felt by many veterans just returning home from war, the guilt and anger and post-traumatic stress disorder, the too-vivid images of death and destruction they have witnessed, the sheer senselessness of war itself.

To Pierce's credit, this isn't knee-jerk anti-war. These characters are red-blooded Americans who rushed to join the military and fight, like many did, after 911. As one character says, we might as well kill 'em in Iraq so we won't have to kill 'em in Texas.

The film's power is in how it shows these men's strong patriotism slowly disintegrate into frustration, confusion and disillusionment. They don't understand why they're fighting or more importantly, how long.

King, the moral center of the movie, fights within himself the sense of loyalty he has for the military and his friends and the feeling, ever growing inside him, that he just doesn't want to fight anymore, that he's done his time and he needs to move on.

The movie is melodramatic in some places, but the performances are strong, the tears well-earned. Pierce has pulled together a poignant movie that refuses to beat you over the head with its message. It just tells a story, making the personal very much political.