Piece Comment

Review of The Cost of War


Here is a debate and it is a subtle one. So here I go weighing in: I found the piece very disturbing. The production is on a professional level: the interview is very, very good and the producer writes well for himself and reads it well. I sympathize with him entirely, and feel that he does make an honest attempt to grapple with what has happened, which for him is very hard because the woman seems to have been a friend on top of everything. But there is so much we don't know. The situation is so unusual and shocking that so many questions are left behind. A single line announces that the woman we have been listening to (and directly emphasizing with) has been murdered by her father. Then she's gone. Say that again? Then it's tidily wrapped up into "the cost of war" leaving a whole universe of information submerged. What happened here was more complex than platitudes about war. This piece for me reflects the cost of the need to simplify, and even to shock and then dump out. It's a "driveway moment" alright. Without the drive. Or the way into what it could all mean.
***********
Update to the review, September 06: I see what my fellow EB member wrote about my "driveway moment" comment. I in fact agree with him exactly. It should NOT be reduced to a driveway moment. But the hurried ending that does not properly delve into what has gone on here but instead tries to wrap it all up boldly IS influenced by a medium that doesn't encourage ambiguity.

I played this piece for a group of students that were really puzzled and had nothing but questions that I couldn't answer - even after we went over all the facts and every word he said.