ZD30 isn’t really one film. It’s at least three films, operating at cross-purposes.

The first film is the controversial, allegedly unflinching look at the use of torture in the war on terror. This film failed for me, mostly because of all the flinching. We are shown water boarding, and stress positions, and physical attacks on a chained prisoner. For their part, they are uncomfortable. The prisoner in question soils himself, and is left to marinate in it. We are meant to see it through the eyes of Jessica Chastain’s character Maya, eyes that at first appear conflicted about the interrogation tactics. It only takes moments, however, for her to show that she has a very pragmatic attitude toward torture, and is more than willing to participate if brutality seems likely to get results.

Losing the one pair of eyes that showed even a modicum of concern about the strategy America pursues in the War on Terror leaves the viewer in an uncomfortable position. From that point on, there are only two positions considered: the single-minded pursuit of Bin Laden, and the obstruction of that pursuit. To get the most impact from the final confrontation with Bin Laden (spoiler alert – we get him) the director abandons most of the complexity of the situation before the first reel is over, and in so doing abandons all hope of making a great film. From that moment, the best it can be is a competent genre flick.

The second film is a very, very boring procedural about the hunt for UBL. Maya is a brittle, monomaniacal agent who must fight the glass ceiling and the lack of vision of her superiors. Think Carrie in Homeland, only with more pouting and less charisma. It’s a turgid CSI:Islamabad that feels like it’s unfolding in real time. This might be a good time to stretch your legs, catch 30 minutes of a different movie, maybe. My suspicion is that this part of the movie has so little grit because if you want to use the fancy DOD gear in the third act, you have to give the DOD final cut.

Finally, with all of the shades of gray safely removed, the film closes with a rousing military picture – the assembling of the SEAL team, the sexy, lingering shots of their exotic hardware, and the night-vision finale that you’ve seen in the trailers. I have to confess to getting caught up in the emotion of the moment and worrying a bit about the outcome, despite the fact that I know how it all turned out.

It wasn’t until The credits were rolling that I started to realize what kind of film this could have been, with a bit more courage.

In the end, the film is about nothing except Maya – her validation, her vindication, her triumph. It’s just a police procedural where Bruce Willis is a fetching redhead. ZD30 chooses, quite deliberately, not to engage with any of the meaty issues that surround it. It’s a quite competent waste of opportunity that tries to distract you from its own cowardice with a Rocky ending. I know it will clean up at the Oscars, but it will also be forgotten as soon as the ceremonies close. It could have been something great, and now the great film to come out of this conflict will be that much harder to make.