Mick Jackson's Critical Darling 'Live from Baghdad' is an Awesome watch. A brutal look at Iraq during the Persian Gulf War in 1991, comes a film that's hard to forget. And Michael Keaton, One Of THE Best Actors in Cinema, Is In Top Form! 'Live from Baghdad' Synopsis: A group of CNN reporters wrestle with journalistic ethics and the life-and-death perils of reporting during the Gulf War.The Persian Gulf War in 1991, was a human-study. It was calculative, manipulative & aggressive. Robert Wiener, Richard Chapman & John Patrick Shanley's Screenplay is Taut & Unforgettable. It delivers a path-breaking story & uses a brutal history piece as its wallpaper. Mick Jackson's Direction is Razor-Sharp. Cinematography is excellent. Editing is good. Performance-Wise: Michael Keaton as Robert Wiener, is masterful. Keaton sinks his teeth into the part & performs with flying colors. Helena Bonham Carter is magnificent, as usual. Paul Guilfoyle is first-rate. Michael Cudlitz is quite natural. Lili Taylor & Bruce McGill are adequate. On the whole, 'Live from Baghdad' is Bloody Good! Strongly Recommended!

What we now know about CNN is that they kept secret many things they knew that Saddam was doing in order to keep this very Baghdad office open. In at least one instance, this resulted in the deaths of two of Saddam's sons-in-law when CNN failed to warn them that they were to be executed when they came back from the U.S. CNN knew this. They kept quiet about what they knew in order to keep their bureau open. The men came back, they were executed. Here is a link:http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2003/04/20/1050777161410.htmlCNN did this throughout the 90's and up until it was clear that the U.S. was going to overrun Baghdad. At that point the senior editor in chief of the Baghdad news bureau did a preemptive admission. He copped to hiding facts that might reflect poorly on Saddam and the Ba'ath Party so that they didn't incur the dictator's wrath. They needed to stay competitive and to protect their Iraqi staff (didn't other networks have this problem as well?) was the justification. My question was and is, if you aren't going to report the truth, or as much of it as you know, then what is the point of your bureau other than that it provided you with a nice income with bonus hazardous duty pay? What is the point in staying competitive when all you are doing is sending out soft stories that steer clear of the truly horrific stuff Saddam was doing? And what is the point of keeping silent about things you know when life and death are in the balance? I need to ask the same thing the guy asks Michael Keaton's character in this film: How do you sleep at night? One might also wonder, why, once CNN cemented itself in the public's mind as the brave network that stuck when others ran, that it curled up in a corner and became a network that protected its own image rather than report the truth of the outrages of Saddam's horrific rule? Whatever they gained in 1991, they lost in 2003, and not only did they lose the confidence of the public, but since 2003 the other networks' credibility has steadily eroded in the face of the multiple checks on them by pajama-clad Internet bloggers who just don't take the networks at their word anymore. This, as far as I'm concerned, is the best thing that has happened to journalism since the Sixties. This movie seems to me to be CNN trying to remind us all how important they are, but events have overtaken them, and this now looks like a display in a museum.

This is an excellent movie from HBO about journalists in Iraq covering the build up to the Gulf War. It is very honest about how journalists risk their lives and freedom so that people get the news accurately. It is also about how 24 hour news channels such as CNN grew up. Today we take for granted, but then it was a big deal. Michael Keaton gives his best performance since Batman here. I hope his career after this.

***POSSIBLE SPOILERS***I liked this movie. It was interesting to see how the 1991 Persian Gulf War was covered and some of the differences to how the present day Gulf War is being covered by the news network. Michael Keaton did a good job of portraying Robert Wiener and so did Helena Bonham Carter as Ingrid Formanek. I thought that Bruce McGill looks like Peter Arnett and I think he did a good job as well. I couldn't believe that Bruce McGill is D-day from "Animal House" either.It was overall a well done film and I think that it was interesting for me after seeing the film to see what some of the real people portrayed in the film are actually doing today. 8.5/10