A Mighty Heart: DVD Review, HD DVD Review (2007)

Features Angelina Jolie in a performance that reminds us that the longtime tabloid fixture is more than just the Third World’s Santa Angelina, Brad Pitt’s main squeeze and, to some, a serial adopter of children.

She’s a woman who can act, and while she hasn’t done much of that since winning the Academy Award for 1999’s "Girl, Interrupted," she does so here by portraying the pregnant journalist Mariane Pearl.

In 2002, Pearl was in Karachi, Pakistan, with her husband, The Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl (Dan Futterman), to investigate shoe bomber Richard Reid through an interview with the elusive Sheikh Mubarik Ali Gilani.

What ensued was a weeks-long nightmare when Danny was kidnapped by Islamic terrorists and then, after a formidable effort to save him, beheaded on videotape.

In lesser hands, the movie could have collapsed into a ripe pool of sentiment, but not so here. With the exception of a brutal yet well-earned scene of uncontainable grief, which is so beautifully handled by Jolie, it alone might win her an Academy Award nomination, "A Mighty Heart" looks at the world and the Pearls’ situation through the eyes of a journalist.

It doesn’t wince, it doesn’t exploit--it just observes, which is enough. What it sees is the moment--not the periphery, only the core--with the moment itself heightened by Michael Winterbottom’s excellent direction, Peter Christelis’ quick-cut editing and Marcel Zyskind’s whiplash cinematography, all of which seamlessly capture the Pearls’ situation--and the grimy chaos of Karachi itself.

Rated R. Grade: A-

For a more in-depth review, click here.