The Hunting Party

Very loosely based on a magazine article about a group of journalists who tried to track down Serbian war criminals still at large in the Balkans, this irreverent black comedy chastises world powers for turning a blind eye when it comes to punishing those responsible for heinous acts against humanity. Richard Gere stars as a risk-taking TV correspondent who lost his network gig after an on-camera meltdown during the Bosnian War and is now a forgotten freelancer. He enlists his former cameraman (Terrence Howard) and a young reporter (Jesse Eisenberg) to track down the most notorious of the wanted men, a poet-general known as The Fox. Alternately lighthearted, bitingly satiric, and positively melodramatic—with episodes that range from brazenly absurd to violently realistic—filmmaker Richard Shepard's The Hunting Party never quite succeeds in melding its divergent tones, but still manages to juggle them reasonably well until the end, when an ill-staged parody of an action-movie sequence is followed by a twist entirely too reminiscent of Marathon Man. While the film is a mixed bag, however, it's still fun to watch Gere cut loose and leave his matinee idol past behind. A strong optional purchase. [Note: DVD extras include audio commentary by writer-director Richard Shepard, “The Real Hunting Party” interviews with Shepard and the journalists featured in the original Esquire article (30 min.), a “making-of” featurette (9 min.), six deleted scenes with optional commentary (6 min.), the original Esquire article “What I Did on My Summer Vacation,” and trailers. Bottom line: a solid extras package for an uneven film.] (F. Swietek)[Blu-ray Review—Nov. 23, 2010—Weinstein, 101 min., R, $19.98—Making its first appearance on Blu-ray, 2007's The Hunting Party features a good transfer with Dolby TrueHD 5.1 sound. Blu-ray extras are identical to those on the standard DVD release, including audio commentary by writer-director Richard Shepard, “The Real Hunting Party” interviews with Shepard and the journalists featured in the original Esquire article (30 min.), a “making-of” featurette (9 min.), six deleted scenes with optional commentary (6 min.), journalist Scott K. Anderson's original Esquire article “What I Did on My Summer Vacation,” and trailers. Bottom line: a solid extras package for an uneven but interesting film.]