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War Within, The
Magnolia Pictures


8.8

based on 22 reviews
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How did we calculate this?

based on 5 votes
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MPAA RATING: Not Rated

Starring Ayad Akhtar, Firdous Bamji, Samrat Chakrabarti, Sarita Choudhury, Aasif Mandvi, Kamal Marayati, Mike McGlone, Nandana Sen, and Varun Sriram

The story of Hassan, a Pakistani engineering student in Paris who is apprehended by western intelligence services for suspected terrorist activities. After his interrogation, Hassan undergoes a radical transformation and embarks upon a terrorist mission, entering the United States to join a cell based in New York City. (Magnolia Pictures)

GENRE(S):	Drama
WRITTEN BY:	Ayad Akhtar Joseph Castelo Tom Glynn
DIRECTED BY:	Joseph Castelo
RELEASE DATE:	DVD: January 31, 2006 Theatrical: September 30, 2005
RUNNING TIME:	90 minutes, Color
ORIGIN:	USA

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

TV Guide Ken Fox

Of all the feature films and documentaries to emerge since 9/11, few have been as bold, perceptive or as downright chilling as this thriller.

Portland Oregonian Shawn Levy

An utterly convincing portrait of the sort of person willing to strap ordnance to himself and decimate scores of strangers in pursuit of his religious and political ideals.

Dallas Observer Staff (Not credited)

One of the strongest--and sure to be controversial--films of the year, The War Within goes places that other films wouldn't dare go.

Chicago Reader Jonathan Rosenbaum

A few plot details strain credibility, but the characters (particularly the friend's sister and little boy) are persuasively depicted.

Austin Chronicle Marc Savlov

It's thanks to Akhtar's standout performance that The War Within is as electrifying as it is.

Seattle Post-Intelligencer William Arnold

The film is highly critical of America's counterterrorist efforts, and not at all subtle in making the point that our stupidity and Nazi-like methods have helped create -- and vastly acerbate -- our problems.

Christian Science Monitor Peter Rainer

What goes on inside the mind of a terrorist who is willing to blow himself for the cause? The War Within is one of the few films that attempts to deal with this subject in a nonexploitative way.

Washington Post Teresa Wiltz

A portrait of a mild-mannered zealot, one that seeps under the skin and unsettles the nerves.

Los Angeles Times Kevin Thomas

Not entirely free from an aura of didacticism or contrivance, but the film by and large functions as a taut thriller. A drastic act late in the film on the part of Duri seems somewhat implausible, but that does not deter The War Within from emerging as a mostly well-wrought and timely tragedy.

Entertainment Weekly Owen Gleiberman

The War Within plays effectively off our voyeurism, yet it has such a cloistered, American-eyed view of the nightmare of terrorism that I kept searching for the profound explanation beneath its piecemeal ones.

Boston Globe Ty Burr

Hampered by a mopey leading man.

Miami Herald Marta Barber

The War Within is dark and somber, adjectives that describe both the film's look and its message.

The Onion (A.V. Club) Tasha Robinson

Sometimes too pat and sometimes ragged with omissions and confusions, but it's still a fascinating look outside of that familiar world and into a harsher one.

The New York Times Janet Maslin

The War Within succeeds only as a thriller with some wartime overtones, rather than as a character study that thrills.

New York Post Kyle Smith

Chillingly realistic but deeply repellent, The War Within is a film that should not have been made.

New York Daily News Elizabeth Weitzman

Despite an admirable effort to explore topical concerns, both director and actor are obviously overwhelmed by the immensity of the subject matter.

San Francisco Chronicle Walter Addiego

Tries too hard to be even-handed.

Chicago Tribune Michael Phillips

The War Within has within it a war of its own, one between docudramatic truth and familiar melodrama, however low-keyed.

LA Weekly Ella Taylor

Mired in noir cliché, the movie manages to be simultaneously overwrought and undercooked, with the Bambi-eyed Akhtar giving such a relentlessly inscrutable performance, one wants to poke him with a stick.

Variety Robert Koehler

An honorable but failed attempt to dramatize the dynamics that propel a basically good man to become a suicide bomber, The War Within contains provocative points inside a dull package.

The Hollywood Reporter Richard James Havis

Does a fairly good job of laying out the basic political motives behind Islamic terrorism. Unfortunately, as a drama, it has its narrative peak in the middle and quickly runs out of story afterward.

Village Voice Michael Atkinson

Shot in DV by Lisa Rinzler, Joseph Castelo's modest drama struggles for verisimilitude, but it wears clichés like concrete boots, down to the cycle-of-intolerance-and-violence message that we hear every day on NPR.

The average user rating for this movie is 8.8 (out of 10) based on 5 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.

Chad S. gave it an8:
In the Choudhury's home, Hassan(Ayad Akhtar) is beseiged by nightmares of his malevolent interrogation and subsequent thrashing in Paris, where he was a mere student(apparently apolitical) who would walk and make plans to see a movie on his cell-phone. We already know this; it's how "The War Within begins(kidnapping, beatdown, first contact with a member of "the brotherhood"). What most of us want from this ever-timely film(as long as we're at war) are flashbacks that parcel out Hassad's transformation from a graduate student to a radical Islamic fundamentalist. Hassan is obviously ill-suited to be a mercenary for Allah; his achilles heel, a heart, is right there on his sleeve with Duri's name on it. He is so in love with her(Nandana Sen). We need to see his teachers and hear their rhetoric, because Hassan's faith in God(a politicized, not the historical Allah) will turn out to be his worst enemy, and not western civilization("I pledge allegiance to the flag of...). His hate for America is so all-encompassing, he'd rather die than slow dance with his best friend's sister to Bread(oh, wait; that's me). Integrity can indeed be a flaw; conversely, Khalid(Charles Daniel Sandoval) sells out his religion for "bad girls". His penis(or rather, his phallic epiphany) makes this compromised Islamic, a heretic(an anti-hero as opposed to hero because Khalid is just horny, not moral) who nevertheless, saves lives by happenstance. "The War Within" is thought-provoking, especially when Hassan indoctrinates Sayeed's son into the world of Islam by coordinating his religious training. In your mind, you'll wage a war between the self-awareness of not being ethnocentric and political incorrectness.

Gerry B. gave it a9:
I thought this was a better film than Paradise Now. Maybe that shows my own ignorance but I am a seasoned film viewer and seldom give ratings of 9 or 10.

judeha gave it a9:
The best movie i seen this year.

harold b. gave it an8:
Not a perfect movie, but its really intense and has one of the best endings I've ever seen. Lead actor and guy who plays Sahid are brilliant. This one should be be seen.

Stevie B. gave it a10:
I have to strongly disagree with some of these so-called critics who themselves display a shocking amount of ignorance not just about Islamic terrorism, but also the craft of making movies. The War Within was the best I have seen yet in terms of movies designed to answer post 9-11 questions.

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War Within, The Magnolia Pictures

War Within, The
Magnolia Pictures