Pearls' Ordeal Makes for a White-Knuckle Docudrama

By Michael Fox

A question that lingers about the 2002 murder of Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl is whether the kidnappers targeted him because he was Jewish.

A Mighty Heart , Michael Winterbottom's gripping recreation of the harrowing month Pearl's pregnant Buddhist wife Mariane endured in Karachi between her husband's disappearance and his death, doesn't provide a definitive answer.

Angelina Jolie gives a fine performance as Daniel Pearl's widow, Marianne Pearl, in  A Mighty Heart , opening June 22, 2007. Photo by Peter Mountain. © 2007 Paramount Vantage, A PARAMOUNT PICTURES company. All Rights Reserved.

It does, however, take every conceivable opportunity to remind audiences that Daniel was Jewish. This willful assertion of his identity, family and values serves as an acknowledgement of anti-Semitism, a warning of its deadly effects and--above all--a steadfast rebuke.

For a Hollywood movie coming out in the summer, that's nothing short of remarkable.

A Mighty Heart , which opens everywhere June 22, is a taut and thought-provoking docudrama that keeps us fully invested in a race against time whose ending we already know. Yet that may be the least of its accomplishments.

Working from Mariane's memoir, A Mighty Heart: The Brave Life and Death of My Husband Daniel Pearl , Winterbottom and co-producers Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie have fashioned a raw and shadowy detective story with a palpably human center.

Daniel, a Journal bureau chief based in India, went to Pakistan with Mariane four months after 9/11 in hopes of interviewing a Pakistani cleric who may have been connected to "shoe bomber" Richard Reid. Intermediaries set up a meeting at a restaurant, and in the film's opening sequences Daniel (played by Dan Futterman) kisses Mariane goodbye and sets out in a taxi.

As soon as Mariane (Jolie) realizes that he's walked into trouble, she organizes a team working out of their home. A journalist born in Paris to Cuban and Dutch parents, Mariane is relentless and skilled in her pursuit of leads.

A Mighty Heart depicts Daniel Pearl as a very smart, very decent man. Mariane, through Jolie's intense yet largely internal performance, comes off as a very smart, very tough woman.

But she doesn't have the influence and resources of the U.S. embassy and Pakistani intelligence, two dubious agencies that quickly get involved. While Mariane works the phones and keeps her anguish in check, the politicos and the investigators use high tech and torture to track down the kidnappers.

Jolie, as Marianne Pearl, and Danny Futterman, as Daniel Pearl, on their wedding day, in A Mighty Heart . Photo by Peter Mountain. © 2007 Paramount Vantage, A PARAMOUNT PICTURES company. All Rights Reserved.

A Mighty Heart is a study in parallels and subtle allusions. The quiet tension of Mariane's house contrasts with the packed, noisy streets. A television reference to the creation of the U.S. detention camp at Guantanamo has echoes later in the Pakistani interrogation of suspects and, ultimately, in Daniel's barbaric killing.

And the horde of photographers stationed outside Mariane's door, and the swarm of TV cameras camped outside Daniel's (Israeli) parents' Southern California house, are the antithesis of the diligent, serious journalism that Pearl risked his life to practice.

These observations are seemingly presented as offhand, but they are carefully designed to add context and depth. Ultimately, the filmmakers are presenting Daniel's killing--and Mariane's response--as something more than just a bloody low point in the so-called war on terror.

At its core, A Mighty Heart is an admonition against dividing the world into us and them, and an illustration of the horrible things that ensue from such a mindset. Mariane Pearl's message, and thus the film's, is one of empathy rather than hatred.

That's a radical notion these days, and a rare goal for a mainstream movie. The crucial measure of this admirable film's success is not box-office receipts but the degree to which it leaves audiences reflective rather than incensed or even sorrowful.

A Mighty Heart opens Friday, June 22.