BATTLE FOR HADITHA

I had a bit of a strange turn mentally over the last few days which has driven me to get incredibly pissed and wander round bars on my own to see what happens. I've been ranting at people. Yesterday I saw the Respect party screening of Nick Broomfields Battle for Haditha in the Curzon, Soho. There is a behind the scenes article in Timeout, also the Times is interesting.

The guardian says

Where Broomfield's film stumbles slightly is in its recourse to set speeches in which characters outline their inner thoughts; perhaps a hangover of the documentary habit of getting people to explain themselves.

I thought this a few times watching it but the characters involved were great.

Afterwards Broomfield took questions, along with an Iraqi journalist who didn't seem to be part of the project. Lindsey German chaired. It was quite funny as it beame obvious the Iraqi guy didn't seem to like Broomfield or his film. First he questioned the veracity of the story, where Broomfields film claims a guy who filmed the famous scene where the Iraqi girl talks about Americans killing her family- was actually one of the guys who planted the roadside bomb.

Broomfield says he got that from the family. He said he had also done extensive interviews with kilo company, all of whom were quite fucked up. The Iraqi journalist also went on to niggle about accents, saying some of the Iraqi actors were Jordanian. This was all very amusing.

I thought the film was great, and I can see how tempting it must be to piece together such a story from so many peoples perspective. I just worry a bit about how the film will be used by people who want to believe all US soldiers are like this, and I worry that Republicans won't watch it. I didn't think it was anti the soldiers involved. Broomfield said he believed they were victims.

Afterwards I went round the corner with some Respect party workers and talked about revolution. I was wanting to buy another drink before I had finished the one I had. I'm not sure why these phases are occurring. I just feel an incredible darkness in my head which is lifted into blissful euphoria by alcohol.