Given the status of “The Hurt Locker,” I suspect our sudden interest in Iraq war flicks may be on the uptake. Most of these impending films will probably be of the anti-war-within-the-war-flick variety, sensitive yet actionpacked, sort of like “war is hell, but since we’re here, let’s throw in a nifty thrill ride, too.”

Of course, Paul Greengrass’

“Green Zone” was in the can long before “The Hurt Locker” scored at the Oscars, and director Greengrass is not new to current affairs. His disturbingly essential “United 93” was as definitive a film about 9/11 as I’ve seen. And his distrust of America’s covert community was firmly apparent with “The Bourne Supremacy” and “The Bourne Ultimatum,” films that established both Greengrass and actor Matt Damon as A-list material.

The question in many people’s minds: Is “Green Zone” simply another “Bourne” saga in disguise? Perhaps “The Bourne WMD Dilemma”? Well, yes and no—although mostly no. This one stands on its own.

Yet fans of the “Bourne” trilogy will find no less intensity here. Greengrass has concocted a high-octane political thriller. Neither the film nor Damon has much time to catch their collective breaths, so expect a wild ride.

“Green Zone” is intense in another way, too. Greengrass doesn’t believe in motionless photography; in his quest for gritty realism, his documentary-style, on-the-move, lights dim, bulletsare-whizzing, hand-held-camera vérité does indeed prove realistic, although if Greengrass gets any more frenetic, theaters may have to hand out airsickness bags. Yeah, the helter-skelter style mostly works, but perhaps someone might remind Greengrass that, whenever his characters sit down to take a breather, it’s okay for the cameraman to do likewise.

Another question buzzing around town: Is “Green Zone” revisionist history? Or is it, as New York Post reviewer Kyle Smith called it, “vicious antiAmerican lies disguised as cheap entertainment”?

Damon plays Chief Warrant Officer Roy Miller who, in postinvasion Iraq (circa 2003), speeds into various hot spots with his squad, trying to locate those pesky WMDs. Remember those? Weapons of Mass Destruction. Promised that these WMD locations have been verified by a reliable source, Miller repeatedly comes up empty. He begins to question the intel the Army’s feeding him and later makes an uneasy alliance with a disgruntled CIA agent (Brendan Gleeson) to discover what’s gone wrong. Or, more aptly, where’s the truth?

In that regard, the film’s about as anti-American as one supposes the truth really must have been. Were there WMDs in Iraq? We didn’t find any, although Saddam Hussein’s forces had plenty of time to move them. (Hey, we’re still trying to figure out if Roosevelt knew the Japanese were going to invade Pearl Harbor.)

But “Green Zone” takes little time discussing the possibility of Saddam’s nuclear stash; by now it’s turned into a full-throttle political thriller. The Iraqis involved—well, nobody’s quite certain if they’re, as Fox News liked to describe them, “bad guys” or “good guys.” But they’re after Miller. And there’s a team of special-forces spooks after Miller as well.

If we’re occasionally lost in that “fog of war” uncertainty, I’ll admit that it lends an air of authenticity to the film. Yeah, it’s a war film. But it’s a mystery too. And a poke at all those government agencies supposedly running the war, telling us on the 6 o’clock news that we’re over there for all the right reasons.

I suppose, if Vietnam were an example of how not to run a ground war, Iraq will ultimately prove a primer on how not to run a secret war. Someday, we may run out of good excuses to wage any sort of war—good for humanity but bad for Hollywood’s actionhero enclave. Perhaps Hollywood will have only itself to blame.

The 82nd Oscars: addendum

Last week, “The Cove” won an Oscar for Best Feature Documentary. The film is now available on DVD. For all you whalesaving, tree-hugging, solar-craving left-wing radical types (I suppose I should include like myself ), this one’s a gotta-see film.

This American film depicts the annual killing of dolphins by a small group of fishermen in a National Park at Taiji, Japan. Some 23,000 dolphins are netted and harpooned each year—then packaged and sold as whale meat in Japan.

Appallingly, dolphins contain a far higher (and unsafe) mercury content than whales do and are unknowingly consumed by the Japanese populace. (Whale meat? Okay, another story.)

The story depicts the efforts of former dolphin trainer Roc O’Barry (remember “Flipper”?) to publicize this senseless slaughter. Unfolding as a spy thriller— O’Barry’s crew must covertly film the carnage—“The Cove” has already had an impact in Japan, perhaps on the future of the slaughter itself. It’s a film that truly exemplifies the power of the camera.