Written and directed by Alexander Frank, The String Puppet is a German film that played at the 2008 Berlin International Film Festival. That should say something - the Berlinale is one of the leading film fests in the world. This is an exceptionally produced war movie that offers a microcosmic snapshot of the mess the Middle East is in.

The action is confined to one abandoned, bombed-out classroom, presumably in Iraq. Two Western soldiers (Lisa-Marie Janke and Rainer Strecker) enter the room and are immediately confronted by an Iraqi boy (Langston Uibel) carrying an assault rifle. The stakes are laid out in the film's stark and chilling opening shot, in which we hear a gunshot and then the camera whip-pans to reveal who's been shot. The unwounded soldier has no food or water to give, so instead he takes a puppet out of his pack and starts to manipulate the strings. I won't reveal what happens next, but suffice to say that no one will walk out of that room with their humanity intact.

Movies about Iraq have had a hard time in the States, both critically and commercially. We simply don't want to be confronted with it. Artists like Frank have a responsibility to keep trying, lest the last six years disappear down some sort of collective memory hole. The String Puppet is among the best movies on the subject I've seen, right up there with In the Valley of Elah and Iraq in Fragments.