Reporter's Notebook

“Year at Danger”

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Well, my initial impression of this movie turns out to be wrong. The filmmaker/director, Maj. Steve Metze of the Texas Army National Guard, didn’t set out on his 2005 deployment to Iraq intending to make a feature documentary. Speaking after the screening, Metze told the audience that he did indeed intend to document his deployment, but he wasn’t sure while he was doing it whether it was just for himself, his family or a larger audience.

 Fortunately, Metze and editor Don Swaynos chose to bring the film to the people.

It’s a fairly standard war documentary: bombs, boredom, missing family, missing birthdays. But with a soldier behind the camera, the soldiers at FOB Danger open up a little bit more. When Mezte asks his commander how he feels about being in charge immediately after the change-of-command ceremony at FOB Danger, the commander replies, “Scared [expletive]-less.” But the CC then asks for a do-over, and delivers a message of excitement and pride in his soldiers that would be very convincing if he hadn’t looked so terrified seconds before.

The thing that will stick with me the most is that this is the only war doc I’ve ever seen that deals with ….

****SPOILER ALERT, highlight if you want to read.

a fratricide.
SPOILER OVER

Metze wasn’t too eager to talk about how he got permission to film all around the war zone, but it doesn’t feel like there’s a strong pro- or anti- anything slant to the movie.

This is the film’s official premier, but Metze has shown it to some of the soldiers featured in it.

After seeing it, “The military guys have all come up and just said thank you,” Metze said. “And then the spouses are primarly coming up and going, ‘Thank you. I had no idea. They never told me anything like this.”

Since soldiers have tended to open up about their experiences after seeing the film, Metze thinks maybe he’ll tour it around military installations if it might help troops work through PTSD. But I think anybody who has deployed or is about to will benefit from watching this movie with their loved ones.