With all the tabloid headlines, her international baby-adopting jaunts and some awful films, Angelina Jolie’s acting skills have been overshadowed.

In the powerful based-on-true events “A Mighty Heart,” the Oscar-winning actress proves that — at least when she’s giving the right material — she’s a remarkable talent.

How good is Jolie in “A Mighty Heart”? A few minutes into the film, you get sucked into the story and forget you’re watching the star, not an easy accomplishment with all the baggage Jolie brings to the screen.

She plays French journalist Mariane Pearl, who, along with her Wall Street Journal reporter husband Daniel (Dan Futterman), travels to Pakistan in early 2002 — despite the fact she’s six months pregnant — to cover the aftermath of the United States’ invasion of Afghanistan after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

As the movie opens, Daniel has set up a delicate interview with a radical cleric with anti-American ties. He doesn’t return from the interview and is soon feared kidnapped.

Because the film is based on such well-known events — the Pearl kidnapping was covered extensively by all the major networks and newspapers — watching the events unfold is almost frustrating. We know what will happen and feel helpless in the face of the coming tragedy.

Director Michael Winterbottom (”The Road to Guantanamo” and “24 Hour Party People”) downplays the more emotional aspects of the story, though, for a more documentary-like approach. He takes us inside the Pakistani-led investigation, surprising us with both the humanity of the detectives and their brutal tactics.

One character, identified only as the Captain (a wonderful Irrfan Khan, who was also superb as the patriarch in “The Namesake” earlier this year), is so sympathetic and caring to Mariane that when he supervises the torture of a suspected kidnapper it’s even more startling.

Besides Khan’s superb supporting work, Will Patton is memorable as a U.S. embassy security agent who has an almost scary admiration of the blunt Pakistani security investigation techniques.

Good, too, is Denis O’Hare as one of Daniel’s editor who comes to Pakistan to help Mariane. He spends a lot of time reading baby books and worrying that the pregnant Mariane isn’t getting enough to eat. Every journalist should have such a sweet editor.

Winterbottom also effectively uses location shooting — much of the film was shot in Pakistan — to tell his story. The shots of traffic-jammed streets and poverty-stricken slums add to the movie’s power.

But in the end, the movie belongs to Jolie. Her fierce, simple performance is worthy of Oscar consideration. Her performance here is clearly the best of her career. There’s none of her usual on-screen vamping or self-aware performance that has made so many of her recent movies so bad. (Anyone remember her accent in “Alexander”? Shudder.)

Let’s hope that “A Mighty Heart” — it’s certainly not the typical summer release and might be a tough sell for summer moviegoers — finds an audience in the sea of bloated comic-book movies and waterlogged pirate flicks.

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This entry was posted on Saturday, June 23rd, 2007 at 4:24 pmand is filed under General. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.

One Response to “Angelina Jolie gives Oscar-caliber performance in ‘A Mighty Heart’”

1. KD Griffin Says:
   June 23rd, 2007 at 11:59 pm

   Great review. I saw it last night and agree completly.

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