Valley Of Elah Research Articles

Signifying Trauma in the Post-9/11 Combat Film: The Hurt Locker and In the Valley of Elah

Since the events of 11 September 2001, an extensive range of genres increasingly feature traumatized protagonists. However, there are acknowledged difficulties in trying to recreate the actual experience of trauma on screen [Walker, J. 2005. Trauma Cinema: Documenting Incest and the Holocaust. Berkeley and London: University of California Press]. Slavoj Žižek [2002. Welcome to the Desert of the Real. London and New York: Verso] explores this dilemma through an extension of Lacanian psychoanalysis, and places trauma in a category termed ‘the Real’ as a form that is resistant to symbolization. This article examines the signification of trauma in two post-9/11 combat films and considers how they enable an understanding of war trauma through the insertion of visuals which construct their respective narratives as traumatic memory, thereby bringing the viewer closer to Žižek’s concept of the traumatic Real.

Captivating Westerns: The Middle East in the American West

Susan Kollin's study of the presence of the Middle East in works of popular culture that are ostensibly about the U.S. West and that are definitionally connected to generic “westerns,” is an intriguing intervention in the field. She shows us the various degrees of reference to the terrain of North Africa and western Asia, including in works in a range of media—films, novels, plays, live performances—starting with works by Mark Twain and Owen Wister, and ending with what she calls “global westerns” of the era after the September 11, 2001, attacks. She includes an extensive discussion of Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein's Oklahoma (1943), and, to a lesser degree, its 1955 film adaptation. She also cites the role of the generic western in structuring post-9/11 U.S. films set in Iraq, such as In the Valley of Elah (2007) and The Hurt Locker (2008), and in such Iran-based texts as the novel Censoring anIranian Love Story by Shariar Mandipour (2009), and Asghar Farhadi's film, A Separation (2011).

The Shaft of Whose Spear Was Like a Weaver’s Beam? Another Suggestion

AbstractThe biblical expression »the shaft of whose spear was like a weaver’s beam« is widely known as part of the description of Goliath’s arms before the battle with David in the Valley of Elah (1Sam 17:7). It appears again in the Bible, however, in a short story about another Israelite hero who killed a Philistine named Goliath, Elhanan son of Jaare-Orgim (2Sam 21:19). In this article I claim that, not only is the shorter, less well known version the original, as many have claimed before me, but I also suggest a new understanding of the term »weaver’s beam«. Rather than understanding it as part of Goliath’s marvelous spear, I see it in fact as an improvised work tool used by the Israelite, Elhanan, in order to kill the Philistine in battle. This new understanding places this story together with other traditions about improvised weapons in the Books of Judges and Samuel.

IEDs and a Jack-in-the-Box: The mystery of motivation in The Hurt Locker (2008)

Abstract Though based upon his non-fiction article ‘The Man in the Bomb Suit’, published in Playboy in 2005, the dramatic structure of Mark Boal’s script for The Hurt Locker (2008) is eccentric, only revealing its true subject, the motivation of its central character for being a bomb technician, just before its ending. In comparison with the clarity of motivations in Paul Haggis’ script for In the Valley of Elah (2007), adapted by him from an earlier non-fiction essay by Boal that also takes place during the Iraq war, the script for The Hurt Locker deviates decidedly from the format of classical Hollywood narrative; because he lacks a clearly defined goal, the psychology and motivations of the central character remain obscure. Indeed a comparison of the final script with an earlier version readily illustrates how rigorously insights into the character’s motivations, and his self-awareness, were reduced. As a result, The Hurt Locker in its final version asks considerably more imaginative and intellectual engagement from its viewers than most commercial cinema.

Khirbet Qeiyafa: An Unsensational Archaeological and Historical Interpretation

The article deals with the finds at the late Iron I settlement of Khirbet Qeiyafa, a site overlooking the Valley of Elah in the Shephelah. It points out the methodological shortcomings in both field work and interpretation of the finds. It then turns to several issues related to the finds: the identity of the inhabitants, their territorial affiliation and the possibility of identifying Khirbet Qeiyafa with sites mentioned in the Bible and in the Shoshenq I list.

Welcome to the Suck: Narrating the American Soldier's Experience in Iraq (review)

Reviewed by: Welcome to the Suck: Narrating the American Soldier's Experience in Iraq Paul Rutz Stacey Peebles . Welcome to the Suck: Narrating the American Soldier's Experience in Iraq. Ithaca: Cornell UP, 2011. vii + 192 pp. Welcome to the Suck takes its title from the catchphrase of Jarhead, Anthony Swofford's memoir of the 1990 Persian Gulf War. With sarcastic pride, this bit of Marine Corps slang is sometimes said to a new enlistee, meaning: whatever you think about war (and military life in general), you're about to learn that, in ways you can't yet imagine, it sucks. For the first time since Vietnam, veterans with wounds both physical and mental are coming home at a steady clip, transitioning into lives as parents, politicians, mechanics, and college students. Situating their stories will become increasingly important as we study American culture in the early twenty-first century. This lucidly written study by Stacey Peebles takes a necessary first step in that analysis, focusing on the Iraq conflict. It is a quick read, organized into four chapters, with an introduction in which Peebles states her thesis: "what is most evident in these narratives is the soldier's desire to be truly 'in between,' to break down and transcend the cultural and social categories that have traditionally defined identity. Ultimately, however, that desire is thwarted. War, and contemporary American war in particular, enforces categorization even as it forces encounters across the boundaries of media, gender, nation, and the body" (2). That is, although service members may want to escape categories, and although joining the military means encountering people, places, and technologies that challenge assumptions, it is a way of life that enforces categories. This will not be news to readers with military backgrounds. In the academy we deem it moral and progressive to respect the choices of individuals who wish to transcend social categories. In combat, however, armies must concentrate primarily on executing jobs efficiently and professionally, not on preserving an individual's favored identity. If they are not subject to strict categories, clear boundaries, and tight rules of engagement, troops often put their lives and the lives of others in more danger. Considering war narratives as accounts of thwarted desire to transcend categories is an interesting place to begin, but the discussion cannot end there. Fortunately, Welcome to the Suck also goes beyond that central thesis, presenting a well-considered cross-section of war narratives. Peebles writes, "The war story, as many writers, filmmakers, and journalists have realized, can now be told through a kaleidoscope of lenses" (48). In that vein Peebles not only includes a variety of media—film, memoir, blogs, and poetry—but she also sets up her [End Page 813] chapters in a manner that emphasizes the kaleidoscopic nature of our encounters with this literature. Fiction informs how we relate to nonfiction when she pairs the HBO documentary Alive Day Memories with the fictional film In the Valley of Elah. Imperial selfishness collides with a wish to inhabit the beauty of other cultures when she puts John Crawford's unabashedly racist and cynical memoir The Last True Story I'll Ever Tell in dialogue with the more culturally aware poetry collection Here, Bullet by Brian Turner—but, she observes, "neither attitude is an inoculation against suffering" (107). The list of pairings also includes memoirs by male combatants in dialogue with one by a female, as well as comparisons between accounts of the 1990 Gulf war with others centering on the 2003 invasion. Peebles wisely emphasizes historical continuum in her readings. She frames the 1990 invasion as part of an ongoing American involvement with Iraq, and she points out how ancient combat texts by Homer, Thucydides, and Virgil fold into and influence today's war stories. Not only should scholars understand these narratives in the context of previous wars, she asserts, but the narrators themselves already do, drawing particularly heavily on Vietnam literature. She writes, "These soldiers are deeply engaged with the images and texts of soldiers who preceded them, though the agency that their engagement provides varies throughout their stories" (47). Statements like this point to the two main strengths of this book. First, Peebles reminds...

The Saw franchise and the representation of terror in post-9/11 American film

According to Stephen Prince in his 2009 book, Firestorm: American Film in the Age of Terrorism, 'For filmmakers concerned about any aspect of 9/11 or its aftermath, the attacks and their legacy offer a tremendously rich and challenging body of material'. It is very difficult to generalize about the response to 9/11 in American film, ranging as it does from its egregious use as a plot twist at the conclusion of the recent romantic drama Remember Me (Allen Coulter, 2010) to more substantive examinations such as In the Valley of Elah (Paul Haggis, 2007) or Jarhead (Sam Mendes, 2005). One might think, however, despite this range, that the most effective way of anatomizing how American film has responded to 9/11, and especially the issue of whether the medium has turned inward in a gesture of self-absorption or outward to engage the world outside the United States, would be to study films that engage directly and explicitly with the events of September 11, 2001. This article takes a different tack by arguing that the most symptomatic American films of the post-9/11 era are the Saw series (beginning with Saw, directed by James Wan in 2004), some of the most financially successful films of recent years, and films that nowhere reference the events of 9/11 explicitly. The article analyses the reasons for the popularity of the Saw films in a post-9/11 context, concentrating in particular on the perverse pleasure American audiences derive from the franchise's suggestion that terror is a self-imposed punishment that takes place in highly scripted situations designed to reveal moral strength, rather than a threatening force imposed from the outside, seemingly at random and with no warning. This emphasis reveals that post-9/11 American film prefers to focus on threats regarded as internal to the United States than to engage with an outside world that is seen in terms of an otherness perceived as more threatening and destabilizing than ever.

The Presence of War: “Here and Elsewhere”1

After reviewing conceptual contributions that address the blurred boundary between the war and home fronts and the complexities of contemporary political topologies in general, I turn to a reading of three artistic texts—the photomontages of Martha Rosler, Paul Haggis’s film In the Valley of Elah, and Annie Proulx’s story, “Tits-Up in a Ditch”—to analyze the war front–home front relationship. I end with some reflections on the analytic contributions of montage techniques in terms of the way they establish equivalences that revalue our perspectives on the locations and actualities (presences) of war.

Terminal Indifference: The Hollywood War Film Post-September 11

Speaking about the state of the Hollywood film industry at the 2008 Academy Awards, the Oscars’ host – comedian Jon Stewart – made the following wry assessment: ‘Not all films did as well as Juno obviously. The films that were made about the Iraq War, let’s face it, did not do as well. But I’m telling you, if we stay the course and keep these movies in the theatres we can turn this around. I don’t care if it takes 100 years. Withdrawing the Iraq movies would only embolden the audience. We cannot let the audience win.’ The films he is referring to include Home of the Brave (2006), In the Valley of Elah (2007) and Stop-Loss (2008) – all of which focus on the personal cost to American soldiers on their return to civilian life, as well as exposing the failure of the US invasion of Iraq at home and abroad. Despite their topical subject matter, these movies were, for the most part, commercial failures. This article seeks to investigate audience indifference (Jean Baudrillard claims a certain indifference is a fundamental consequence of the Western globalising ideology) to mainstream cinematic depictions of the post September 11 invasion of Iraq, via a consideration of the trauma and abjection depicted in these films. Baudrillard’s hypotheses on terrorism – as a symbolic challenge put forth by terrorism (embodied by the attack on the Twin Towers) – and the West’s incapacity to respond to it, forms the basis for our investigation of the limits of these films to incite and engage viewers. His writings offer a lens through which to consider how ‘terrorism’ operates symbolically, and fundamentally, the dilemmas this raises for a Western psyche grappling with how the ‘terrorist threat’ might be answered, engaged with, responded to.

Warring Pixels

/ This article explores the ways in which the films In the Valley of Elah (2006), Battle for Haditha (2007) and Redacted (2007) act as forms of testimony to the Iraq conflict and to the roles played by digital technology in bearing witness to it. The article argues for a greater recognition of the materiality of the digital and for an acknowledgment of its indexical properties as this has significant implications for its status as testament and for its claims to authenticity. Drawing on Wilfred Bion's work on the container/contained relationship, the article also suggests that the films perform a valuable function as containers that provide historical events such as the conflict in Iraq with a graspable form. Works of mainstream cinema that engage with recent history are often viewed ambivalently but the article argues that, on occasion, they can make a significant contribution to the production and dissemination of cultural memory.

In the Valley of Elah ‐ Directed by Paul Haggis

Peace & ChangeVolume 34, Issue 3 p. 395-398 In the Valley of Elah - Directed by Paul Haggis Donna Alvah, Donna Alvah St. Lawrence UniversitySearch for more papers by this author Donna Alvah, Donna Alvah St. Lawrence UniversitySearch for more papers by this author First published: 11 June 2009 https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-0130.2009.00587.xRead the full textAboutPDF ToolsRequest permissionExport citationAdd to favoritesTrack citation ShareShare Give accessShare full text accessShare full-text accessPlease review our Terms and Conditions of Use and check box below to share full-text version of article.I have read and accept the Wiley Online Library Terms and Conditions of UseShareable LinkUse the link below to share a full-text version of this article with your friends and colleagues. Learn more.Copy URL Share a linkShare onFacebookTwitterLinked InRedditWechat Volume34, Issue3July 2009Pages 395-398 RelatedInformation

Taking Chance

First-time director Ross Katz's hbo-produced film Taking Chance premiered at the 2009 Sundance Film Festival in January, went directly to hbo in February, and will have to rely on dvd sales and rentals for the wider audience it deserves. At least it has been spared the dismal box-office fates accorded other worthy Iraq War films such as In the Valley of Elah (2007) and Grace Is Gone (2007). Kevin Bacon plays Marine Corps Lt. Col. Mike Strobl, who, with Katz, wrote the script based on his memoir of serving as a military escort for the body of Pfc. Chance Phelps, who was killed in Iraq on Good Friday, 2004. On his way to Phelps's home in Wyoming, Strobl encounters a range of civilians and military personnel, all of them quietly respectful, even reverent, about the young man's death. The film takes no strident position on the Iraq War. The most pointed comment comes from a young man who tells Strobl he is not sure about what the United States is doing over there.

In Search of the Ancient Name of Khirbet Qeiyafa

This article discusses the identity of the recently excavated stronghold of Khirbet Qeiyafa, a tenth century BCE site located near the Valley of Elah, in the area where the story of the battle between David and Goliath takes place. There is also the story of a battle between Elhanan the Bethlehemite and Goliath of Gath that takes place at Gob (2 Sam 21:19). In light of a comparison of the two episodes I suggest identifying Khirbet Qeiyafa with biblical Gob. A close reading of the four anecdotes related in 2 Sam 21:15-22 clarifies the message of the early biblical tradition of four battles fought between Israelite and Philistine elite warriors that culminated in the advance of the Israelite troops to the gates of Philistine Gath.

Review: In the Valley of Elah

Review: In the Valley of Elah

Trapped: The Iraq War Veteran on Film

Like many members of the moviegoing public, I didn't rush to see Home of the Brave (2006), In the Valley of Elah (2007), Redacted (2007), Grace Is Gone (2007), A Mighty Heart (2007), Badland (2007), or any of the other feature films that deal with the U.S.-led war in Iraq. Many of these films spent scant weeks in the theaters and made almost no money. Only In the Valley of Elah was praised by critics (mostly owing to Tommy Lee Jones’ performance) and did reasonably well at the box office, earning just over $6.5 million. The war in Iraq has dragged on against popular expectations, and media accounts have varied little over the last few years, regularly reporting assassinations, roadside explosions, and car bombs in public places, among other dire developments that make any kind of success difficult to imagine. Sitting through a film about Iraq was not high on my list or, apparently, on anyone else’s, of things to do.

Spiraling Downward: America in Days of Heaven, In the Valley of Elah, and No Country for Old Men

Abstract Bringing together the DVD reissue of Terrence Malick's Days of Heaven, Paul Haggis's In the Valley of Elah, and Joel and Ethan Coen's No Country for Old Men, this essay argues that the three films are indictments of the violent history of American militarism.