New York is plunged into chaos after Arab terrorist cells set off a series of bombs. Heading up the hunt for the terrorists is veteran FBI agent Anthony Hubbard (Denzel Washington); Hubbard hopes CIA operative Elise Kraft (Annette Bening), whose contacts are members of the Arab community, will lead him to the mastermind behind the attacks.

When it becomes clear that the FBI is unable to curb the attacks, the President declares a state of martial law in New York City, placing Major General William Devereaux (Bruce Willis) in charge of the city’s security. Devereaux and his troops quickly begin rounding up all Arab men between the ages of fourteen and thirty, including the son of Frank Haddad (Tony Shalhoub), Hubbard’s partner; realizing that the Army’s methods are doing more harm than good, Hubbard and Haddad race to find the last remaining terrorist cell.

CRITIQUE

For much of its running time, Edward Zwick’s The Siege is an intelligent, intriguing thriller; many of Zwick’s films are attempts at crafting popular entertainment that’s more ambitious than your average blockbuster. Taking its inspiration from the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, the film presents an almost prescient look at a city ravaged by terrorism. And in speculating just how far the U.S. government would go to protect the lives of its citizens, as well as asking just how much said citizens would be willing to give up if they believed it would afford them more security, it seems eerily prophetic.

When it was first released--three years after the Oklahoma City bombing and three years before the 9/11 attacks--the film seemed a little far-fetched, stretching the probability and possibility of such events in the name of dramatic license. Today, however, when you hear the characters discussing body counts numbering less than a thousand, it’s clear that Zwick and co-writers Lawrence Wright and Menno Meyjes didn’t take things far enough.     

Unfortunately, the film loses its way during the last half hour. Zwick isn’t content with simply making a thriller, so he tries to reach beyond the confines of the material and morph the film into a full-blown socio-political treatise, meanwhile forgetting almost any notion of being entertaining.

The speeches start flying in the final act, and the Bruce Willis character becomes a caricature of a stereotype (Willis’s somnambulant acting certainly doesn’t help matters), which damages the film as a whole. This sudden shift also complicates the plot, which leaves little time to successfully wrap up the film.

Instead of an intelligent, challenging ending, Zwick tosses in two confrontations that simply don’t work, and the Bening character’s decisions in the last innings seem more like the actions of a twelve-year-old girl. And the final scene is far too simple and neat; there’s no way such a situation could possibly be resolved in any way close to the manner in which the movie ends.

There’s no doubt Zwick could have achieved all of his aims within the film’s two hours, but the way he attempted it here was the wrong approach. He’s stated that he wanted to examine the aftermath of such events just as much as he wanted to craft a procedural thriller, but it’s obvious he was never able to find the right balance.

The Siege came under considerable fire for its depiction of Arab terrorists, but I fail to see the movie’s plot as being culturally disreputable. Claiming that The Siege is a slap in the face of Arabs is like claiming Die Hard is a slap in the face of Eastern European males. The film in no way implies (much less states) that all Arabs are terrorists or that all terrorists are Arabs. It makes clear that those who carry out such acts are a small segment of the Arab population, and even uses the argument that many terrorist acts committed against U.S. citizens and interests come in retaliation for American opportunism and disinterest, and in the end the U.S. government is made just as culpable as the terrorists themselves. You can call this playing it safe, or call it muddying the waters, whatever--but the fact remains the film isn’t an anti-Arab polemic.

THE VIDEO

Let’s see here. Blu-ray has been around for roughly three years now, and for a while there it was starting to look like we had finally moved beyond releases that gave the finger to one of the two new high-def codecs in favor of MPEG-2 transfers with beefed-up bitrates. Looks like we all got fooled, as Fox has encoded this 25GB disc’s 2.35:1/1080p transfer with the space-hog that is MPEG-2. (And if you’re thinking an MPEG-2 transfer slapped onto a single-layer disc means you’re going to get shortchanged in another area, you’ve obviously been paying attention. We’ll get to that in a minute.)

That being said, the transfer looks quite good; it’s not a monumental improvement over the standard-def disc, but it’s certainly more than sufficient. The cold grays and blues that dominate the visuals’ color palette look very good; despite the slight softness that seems to have been a stylistic choice, small details come through.

And if you’re like me and enjoy spotting production flaws, check out the shot of Washington being knocked to the ground by the bus explosion; the advanced resolution here makes the fake blood that squirts from his nose looks like a mixture of Silly String and food coloring.

THE AUDIO

The DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 is also a nice upgrade from the DVD’s Dolby Digital track. The mix is front-heavy, but the lossless encode does open it up a bit. The action scenes, which spread the mix throughout the entire soundfield, still sound very good, and Graeme Revell’s terrific score has never sounded better. Dialogue remains clear throughout. The low end could have been a bit punchier, but that’s a minor complaint.

Optional French and Spanish Dolby Digital 5.1 dubs are also included, as are subtitles in English SDH, Spanish, Cantonese, and Korean.

THE EXTRAS

Two years ago Fox re-released The Siege on DVD. Dubbed the “Martial Law Edition,” that release boasted a commentary by Zwick and executive producer Peter Schindler, three featurettes, and two theatrical trailers.

This Blu-ray disc, which will run you a few more bucks than the DVD, contains almost none of that material; yep--all of those supplements and Fox includes only one single trailer.

Had they used one of the more compression-friendly codecs, there’s a chance all of the material could have fit on a single-layer disc.

There’s only one way to describe this move: deplorable.              

FINAL THOUGHT

Despite its flaws, The Siege is still largely an intelligent, well crafted thriller, one deserving of a far better treatment than Fox affords it on this release. Consumers deserve far better, too.