Powerful in both sound and visuals, this suspenseful story of a crack trio of bomb-disposal experts on the hostile streets of Baghdad will get your adrenaline pumping and leave you breathless.

It’s remarkable that although we are six years into the U.S.-led military campaign in Iraq, there has been no definitive Iraq war movie released until now. Helmed by visionary director Kathryn Bigelow and based on journalist Mark Boal's real experiences following bomb disposal experts in Iraq, The Hurt Locker will blow you away. Bomb disposal is a high-stakes, palm-sweating, beat-the-clock exercise in problem solving. Swaggering new sergeant James (Jeremy Renner — see also Lightbulb in the Festival) has a record of 900 defused devices and counting. Following an incident, he joins a highly trained bomb disposal unit where he surprises his two subordinates, Sanborn (Anthony Mackie) and Eldridge (Brian Geraghty), by behaving as if he’s indifferent to death. Psychopathic or heroic, James’s risk-taking creates discord. With less than 40 days left in their rotation before a break from service, Bravo Company will have to learn to trust each other and bond together in order to survive work that has zero margin for error. -- Carol Coombes