Kurtlar Vadisi: Irak

A commando of Turkish intelligence agents enter Irak to avenge a real life episode in the war where Turkish soldiers were arrested and blindfolded by American troops. A very good action film, condemned unseen by many in the west, it represents at least a change of pace by showing the Muslims as the good guys and the Americans as the bad guys. The movie is actually very strongly against terrorism (the Sheikh in the movie criticizes the terrorists who wants to behead an American journalist, and prevents this from happening) but is also against American ignorant meddling in the Middle East. Most of all, though, Valley of the Wolves is a terrific action movie. And Billy Zane - who has apologized to the American press for appearing in this film - has actually one of the best performances in his career as a real meanie.

It's actually surprisingly slick for a Turkish movie, considering it's also part of an ongoing TV series, kinda like their "24".

The Good:

The actors all did well, and I'm surprised to see so many real American actors, including Busey and Zane in such a blatantly anti-war movie. The music The cinematography The editing The special effects

The Bad:

The production design is cheap by movie standards. The US military uniforms are not very believable and many of the US soldiers speak with thick accents (especially the jailer at Abu Ghraib). The plot is not believable, with the four Turkish special forces guys taking out a LOT of American G.I.'s at the climax. The US soldiers are shown to be cartoonishly evil - one guy even kills one of his own men for threatening to tell on him for killing some Iraqi civilians! Gary Busey as a Jewish Doctor harvesting organs to send to the West - a bit far fetched.

As ludicrous as it gets, this movie is a real eye-opener to how the Islamic world sees us. The war is controversial and polarizing here, just like this movie and most Americans are gonna love it or hate it long before they actually watch it. I liked it. One almost never sees an American (non-documentary) movie with the guts to be so completely one-sided, especially when our questionable foreign policy is involved. US soldiers as the bad guys, led by a fanatical Christian zealot, is definitely not something one sees every day. This movie is kinda like THE OMEGA CODE 2 turned on its head. Between the bad and the good, VALLEY OF THE WOLVES: IRAQ at least never fails to be entertaining.

Turks are not Iranians, their Islamic cinematography has much to be desired. Yet even they, provided sufficient money, can reach Hollywood level entertainment quality, and this movie certainly proves that, so emulating Hollywood, which is typically even more shallow and stupid but shiny and bombastic, is really possible anywhere. What Turks bring to the table is realism, realism in portrayal of american war criminal mentality that plagues the world in the last decades. It is a satisfying antidote to Hollywood stupidity of patriotic shallow stupid pro-Amurican anti everyone else propaganda, and is both technically and morally superior to average CIA propaganda vomit like Black hawk down or Top gun. That being said, it is still a mediocre movie with only its objectivity to elevate it above it.

I liked this movie.. I know it was a big deal back in Turkey, since it had a soap opera and all but I didn't have any knowledge about that when I watched the movie. If you think this movie is anti-semitic or brings up the issue of raising anti-American spirit, I'd like to remind you the midnight express movie. Americans shall be as well very familiar with the effect of a wrong assumption/judge-mental movie... You see it here in the United States every day, on TV, on movies and etc. I don't understand what is the big deal when another country does the same to the US? We should have the same criterion's for any movie not depending on their nationality but their qualifications. So overall, I suggest this movie not only because it is a perception of another culture also because it is a fun adventure type movie..

After being the top TV series of Turkey for many years, Kurtlar Vadisi (Valley of the Wolves) now appears as a cinema film. Year 1996 was a break stone in Turkish cinema history, in which Eskiya (The Bandit) was seen by more than one million people, which could be counted a very high number for that time. People started to revise their opinions about the national cinema. After Eskiya, high-budget movies followed, being seen by millions of people, and giving out the signs that Turkey was in fact a really profitable country for film-making, if the needs of the people were analyzed well. The result of the analysis is simple: People would pay for the movies if they knew the cast from television. Good or bad, every movie having its basis on TV worked well on the screen. Kurtlar Vadisi Irak will do good on the screen, without any doubt, for the same reason. However, there is a difference now. The movie is based on the characters from the series, but the story is completely different. It zooms in the war in Iraq, with a different subjectivity than the American one. The makers of the movie could base the story on the mafia events that the viewers of the TV series were used to, but they took a risk and carried the war to the screen. Billy Zane appears in the movie, which will take the attention of international viewers. Time will show, if the movie is going to be a success out of Turkey, but we can say, it has simply guaranteed the top in Turkey.