Cartel Land

Beyond the usual genre themes of heroism and sacrifice, the best war films tend to project a sense of an intractable and ultimately unwinnable situation. Matthew Heineman's enthralling documentary Cartel Land, while not technically a war film in any militaristic sense, explores that same sense of frustration. Cartel Land examines the brutal violence being waged on America's doorstep by the Mexican drug and human trafficking cartels, and especially at the armed vigilante movements that have sprung up on both sides of the border in retaliation. The movie's executive producer is Kathryn Bigelow, and it's no surprise she got behind it—Cartel Land has all of the electricity of her films The Hurt Locker and Zero Dark Thirty, yet it consistently remains a level-headed and unbelievably intimate piece of cinematic journalism. Heineman and his crew gain a terrifying level of access, giving us front-row seats to the drug war. D.B.