A funny and completely arresting true story unfolds in “Operation Filmmaker,” a documentary about a road paved with good intentions. This was supposed to be a heartwarming movie — or so everybody thought when filming began.
It kicks off with a chance event: Actor Liev Schreiber happened to be watching MTV the night it featured a report about a charismatic young film student, Muthana Mohmed, in Baghdad. Muthana’s school had been destroyed in the war and it looked as though his dreams of making movies were also rubble.
Schreiber was about to direct a picture, “Everything is Illuminated,” in Prague. Why not hire this young Iraqi to work as an intern? And why not hire a “making-of” documentarian to chronicle the experiment?
What follows is a wonderfully entertaining train wreck. Muthana turns out to be a much gnarlier character than anybody expected. He’s used to having his needs met by a supportive family, and he makes it known that the grunt jobs on a movie set (fetching coffee for the producers, working the copier) are, frankly, beneath him.
More troubling is his blissful assumption that other people will take care of the details. When his visa is about to run out, he waits around for the increasingly exasperated producers to save the day. Or loan him money. Or get him another gig on another Prague shoot.
Documentary director Nina Davenport (who ends up loaning Muthana money herself) surely sensed an excellent movie subject, no matter how irritating and imperious Muthana would become. She sticks with the project even in the months after “Everything is Illuminated” is finished, as Muthana scrambles to avoid returning to Baghdad — where, he says, his life will be at risk for having worked with an American film company.
This movie offers up all sorts of complications. For instance, even though Muthana is a jerk in many ways, he’s got a point when he rolls his eyes at the American producers who prefer their snacks mixed in a certain way.
And when he loses it and criticizes Davenport, saying that she and the other producers “just want a beautiful story” for their own purposes, he’s right too.
Davenport plays up the analogy at the heart of the picture: of Americans delving into Iraqi affairs and creating a mess with no immediate solution.
But there’s another irony. With his obnoxious manners, gift for artful dishonesty, and ability to manipulate others, Muthana actually has the classic ingredients of a Hollywood director. This kid is going places.
“Operation Filmmaker”
Ironic: Funny and entertaining documentary about what happens when a Hollywood film crew hires a young Iraqi as an intern on their production, little suspecting the guy would become a major pain. The movie operates on a lot of different levels — and the irony is, its obnoxious star actually has a lot of attributes of a successful Hollywood director.
Rated: not rated; probably PG-13 for language
Now showing: Northwest Film Forum, 1515 12th Ave., Seattle; 206-329-2629
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