It's 1992 Sarajevo. Reporters are navigating the random everyday violence in the besieged city. Michael Henderson (Stephen Dillane) is a British ITN reporter. Jane Carson (Kerry Fox) and Annie McGee (Emily Lloyd) are the producers. Risto Bavic (Goran Visnjic) is their new fixer. Jimmy Flynn (Woody Harrelson) is the flashy hard-charging American reporter doing big stories. Michael starts doing stories on orphanages to shame the international community. He meets aid worker Nina (Marisa Tomei) who organizes an UN convoy to transport the orphans.This is more advocacy than story. The real situation is devastating and needs to be told. The movie needs a more compelling cohesive plot. Stephen Dillane is a solid character actor but he's not really a movie leading man. Woody Harrelson is not in this that much and Marisa Tomei is in it even less. There are harrowing things happening in this movie. It uses news footage. It compiles a dark picture but the story is not gripping enough.

I'm just writing this review to point one thing out, the true story of Michael Nicholson (whom this movie is based off) involves him adopting and rescuing a Serbian girl named Natasha, not a Bosnian (Muslim) girl named Emira. Plenty of Serbian's themselves died in the siege of Sarajevo as we made up over 1/3 of the cities population. I'm not sure what the motive was behind switching the girl's ethnicity but I can only suspect that it was motivated by Hollywood's desire to uncomplicate a complicated mess as well as pander to public consensus that Serbs were the aggressors and the 'bad' guys while Bosniaks (Muslims) were the victims, 'good' guys.As far as the artistic merits of the movie herself, I liked how she interwove real footage with fiction, blurring the distinction. I also found it refreshing that such a marginal topic was brought to the big studios even though no one really watched. In the end though, the movie was okay, maybe even good but not great. The acting was fairly flat and the character development was mostly two dimensional. When the movie finishes, you forget about it.

Just to point out something, that previous comment that said that Muslims weren't the victims in this war, just to tell you, how can anyone know who was the victim and who wasn't? My father lost all of his family in this war, his younger sister was shot right in front of him. His mother died a painful death, today my father has no one to call and check on to, why? because NOT all, but most Serbs who fought the war didn't give a rat's ass if you were a Muslim child, youngster, or if you needed a cane to walk with, all they wanted is murder and believe me i had to witness all of that myself.To generally speak about this movie, i watched it just right now as we speak, and the movie qualifies to show you some of the brutal slaughters that happened during those tragical unbelievable years. You can ask any Bosnian Muslim about the war, and they won't talk about it. My best friend's older brother was 9 years old when he saw Serbian soldiers take his father to his own backyard, torturing him, and killing him in front of his very own child, and then people dare to say that the Serbs were the victims? still this day, my friend's brother has effects from that day, you look at his face and you know that there is something wrong.This isn't basically a movie review, this is MY side of the story on how it happened and on how no one seemed to care about hundreds of children dying each day because some stupid nonsense pricks decided to kill everyone just to have their own F'n independence, well all i can say is i take big Sh.. on your independence. This movie brought my friends to tears, those who don't know 1% about the war, and surely it will bring those who actually lived it. I voted it a 10 just because i am actually glad they show the real side of the war, and how WE were the F'n victims. Hate this comment or love it, i don't care, but at least i shared the truth of my opinion, and the truth of our war.

The wars in former Yugoslavia were prolonged and bitter and - need we remind ourselves - located in 'civilised' Europe, so it is surprising that the conflict has resulted in so few films. It's almost as if there is a collective guilt about the weakness of international involvement until the Serbs tried to subjugate Kosovo and NATO finally intervened. Hollywood still shows no interest in this topic - this movie is a largely British effort, although it features two American stars (Woody Harrelson and Marisa Tomie)in support roles.The narrative, most of which actually occurred, is set in the Bosnian capital Sarejevo and - like "Under Fire" dealing with Nicaragua - focuses on war as seen through foreign media correspondents. It is based on the book by the British ITN journalist Michael Nicholson entitled "Natasha's Story". The reporter Michael Henderson (played sensitively by little-known Stephen Dillane) finds himself unexpectedly involved emotionally in events to the extent of deciding illegally to bring supposed orphan Emira out of the war-ravaged country and to his own home in England.British director Michael Winterbottom shot the film on location in Sarjevo itself and parts of Croatia and Macedonia and this, plus the semi-documentary style of filming, gives a powerful authenticity to the work. There is no political background or scene-setting: we jump straight into the carnage and are as confused as the Bosnians being shelled and shot at. The political messages come from short but effective news clips of quotes from international figures, showing the powerlessness and incapacity demonstrated by too many of them at the time.