Advanced Search >
Help Me Search

Movies

Weekend Box Office
Film Awards & Top 10s By Year
All-Time High Scores
All-Time Low Scores
Best / Worst of the Decade

Wide Releases
Now In Theaters

sort by namesort by score

Stars indicate the most critically-acclaimed movies.

Limited Releases
Now In Theaters

sort by namesort by score

Stars indicate the most critically-acclaimed movies.

Battle for Haditha

EMAILPRINTHanway Films

Battle for Haditha reviews
65
6.7 User Score:

Generally favorable reviews

Based on 12 critic reviews
How did we calculate this?

Based on 4 votes
Read user comments
Rate this movie >

Movie Info

Genre(s): Drama  |  War

Written by: Nick Broomfield
Marc Hoeferlin
Anna Telford

Directed by: Nick Broomfield

Release Date:
Theatrical: May 7, 2008

Running Time: 97 minutes, Color

Origin: UK

Language(s): English | Arabic

Summary

RATING: Not Rated

Starring Elliot Ruiz, Yasmine Hanani, Andrew McLaren, and Matthew Knoll

November 19, 2005, Haditha, Iraq: Iraqi insurgents bomb a convoy of US Marines, resulting in the death of their most popular officer. His young, enraged Marine buddies carry out a brutal retaliation. Their violent house search leads to the massacre of 24 people, many of whom are women and children--tragic causalities of a war they cannot control. The Marines, too, are victims, attacked, wounded, and forced to respond in the way they have been trained. But when events occur at great speed and under extreme stress, can Marines in the line of fire be accused of murder? (HanWay Films)

What The Critics Said

All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...

100

Entertainment Weekly Owen Gleiberman

Searing, powerful, and morally entangled.

Read Full Review >
80

New York Magazine David Edelstein

Battle for Haditha has some of the raw energy of Sam Fuller's war pictures, which weren't subtle but left you energized by their ambivalence (there was no good or evil). It's a hell of a picture.

Read Full Review >
80

The Hollywood Reporter Michael Rechtshaffen

With its dialogue largely improvised by many who had seen extensive combat in Iraq, Battle for Haditha has a gripping authenticity lacking in other similarly themed dramas.

Read Full Review >
80

Variety Robert Koehler

Intense, fair-minded entry in the pileup of Iraq pictures.

Read Full Review >
75

The Onion (A.V. Club) Nathan Rabin

Unsubtle but gripping.

Read Full Review >
70

Salon.com Andrew O'Hehir

Largely improvised, cast with ex-Marines and Iraqi refugees and shot in Jordan. It might just be the movie this war has been waiting for.

Read Full Review >
70

Village Voice Anthony Kaufman

An engaging Iraqudrama that straddles the line between blistering exposé and Spielbergian heart-tugger.

Read Full Review >
63

Philadelphia Inquirer Steven Rea

Lacking in subtlety and nuance, Broomfield's nerve-jangling movie nonetheless succeeds in showing the war from various vantage points. And from wherever one's standing, the view is profoundly disturbing.

Read Full Review >
60

The New York Times Manohla Dargis

Mr. Broomfield maintains a level of cool detachment throughout. That's to the good of the movie, which, though technically exemplary, falters dramatically on occasion, becoming dangerously close to overheated whenever the characters speak for any length.

Read Full Review >
50

TV Guide Ken Fox

Broomfield's film is didactic, awkwardly acted by the cast of former Marines who are meant to lend the film credibility, and clumsily inflammatory.

Read Full Review >
50

Chicago Reader J.R. Jones

Broomfield, whose celebrity exposés are known for their intrusiveness and innuendo, lost me with his gentle shower scene between an Iraqi woman and her husband; even if it wasn't invented, is it really any of our business?

Read Full Review >
25

New York Post Kyle Smith

The film is an exposé only of a filmmaker's senseless contempt for the military.

Read Full Review >

What Our Users Said

The average user rating for this movie is 6.7 (out of 10) based on 4 User Votes

Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.

Popular on CBS sites: College Signing Day | Olympics | Lost | iPhone | Cell Phones | Video Game Reviews | Free Music

About CBS Interactive | Jobs | Advertise

© 2010 CBS Interactive Inc. All rights reserved. | Privacy Policy (UPDATED) | Terms of Use