The Covenant

Dar Salim and Jake Gyllenhaal

Guy Ritchie's The Covenant is an unsuccessful male bonding fable set amidst the US Army's attempt to subdue the Taliban in Afghanistan. Jake Gyllenhaal portrays John Kinley, a tightly wound Master Sergeant tasked with the most difficult search and destroy missions. Dar Salim portrays Ahmed Abdullah, Kinley's interpreter, who saves his life during a raid. Abdullah then has to drag Kinley's semi-comatose carcass hundreds of klicks through the Afghan hinterlands, all the while evading the evil hordes of the Taliban. much to Abdullah's and my own exhaustion.

Thanks to Abdullah, Kinley makes it back to the states in one piece. However, when he learns that Abdullah and his family are still in Afghanistan and on the run from the baddies, he becomes obsessed with retrieving them and bringing them to the States. This mission provides the film with a third act. There are many clunky, repetitive scenes of flashbacks and exposition. Gyllenhaal tries to nail the thousand yard, "Still in Saigon" stare. As has been proven before, Gyllenhaal is not suited to play a jarhead. He is too laid back to capture a hard-boiled military man. For better casting of a similar type, see Sean Penn as Sgt. Welsh in The Thin Red Line. Salim is a better fit as the taciturn Abdullah. He masters the necessary stoicism that befits the action genre. 

As usual in Ritchie's films, attempts at characterization are feeble. The supporting cast does their best, but there are few ideas, themes or even quirks to work with. The attempts to evoke the sardonic banter of a military core are limp and seem bowdlerized. The score is full of feeble mickey mousing and whatever possessed Ritchie to start the film off with America's "A Horse with No Name" on the soundtrack. Maybe because it mentions the desert. Anyhow, Ritchie forte is the direction of action sequences and these make The Covenant watchable. Indeed, the film is Ritchie's best since Snatch. Truly damning with faint praise.