1-03-07, 9:41 am

After four years of war, 2006 proved to be profitable for those producing films that question the values of war perpetuated by the lickspittles of the White House.

That many of them have hailed from the belly of the beast that we call Hollywood makes them all that more important, since they must have contributed towards the disillusionment with Bush.

First up, Sam Mendes's Jarhead exploded on our screens to remind us that the squaddies' life isn't all that heroic, not even in the walk-over commonly known as the first Gulf war.

Based on the book by ex-marine Anthony Swofford (Jake Gyllenhaal), it follows in his faltering footsteps from the moment that he joined up - 'I got lost' - to his terrifying training as a sniper.

The problem is that he never gets to kill anybody in anger, the whole thing simply proving to be pointless, an exercise in military might and madness, a folly not to be repeated.

Flagging up the end of the year, Clint Eastwood's film Flags of Our Fathers was released to a howl of right wing criticism, accusing Eastwood of being unpatriotic and attacking their most cherished symbol - Old Glory.

That's the Stars and Stripes to everyone else that has had to suffer when they see it emblazoned on the wings of the bombers that have blitzkrieged their country over the last 60 years.

Eastwood - acutely aware of how Bush exploited the jingoism of the last world war to launch his world war - simply pointed up the fact that the US has never been afraid to lie when waving the flag.

Flags refers to the two flags that were raised on Mount Suribachi during the battle of Iwo Jima, the first by a group of unknown soldiers and then again when they replaced it by a bigger flag.

The latter incident was photographed by news journalist Joe Rosenthal and was carried on the wires only to be seen by the politicians as a golden opportunity to sell government war bonds.

Thus, the three survivors of the second raising of Old Glory were rushed around the country, the experience giving us a taste of what would prove to be an ugly imperialist future.

Eastwood quite rightly recognises that there were many heroes during World War II and such propaganda stunts only serve to feed our cynicism, not encourage our admiration.

In short, the politicians then and now will use anything to get their way, as Stephen Gaghan so ably demonstrates in Syriana with George Clooney playing a former CIA man trying to expose his criminal masters.

This was the first of two fine films featuring Clooney, the second Good Night, And Good Luck - which he directed - clearly made as criticism of the government-inspired hysteria against antiwar critics.

Clooney plays legendary TV news man Ed Morrow, the only journalist working for the Establishment press who stood up to the bullying tactics employed by Senator Joe McCarthy during the 1950s.

Mention should also be made of Paul Greengrass's amazing recreation of the flight of United 93, a film that beats to the heart of its participants, reminding us all that Bush ignored the event until it was too late.

Oliver Stone's recreation of events in World Trade Center didn't satisfy everybody, many feeling his two 'heroic' rescue workers tended to put many questions that were being asked about responsibility for the event in the shade.

Members of the British Empire need no lectures on the use and abuse of propaganda. They have lied their way across the world in pursuit of pillage, privilege and profit.

This has been true in these so-called British Isles, with successive invasions dividing the home nations and then the English raping their first colonies of raw materials and labour.

It is rare for our film-makers to recognise this, least of all illustrate the fight for liberation as conceived by Ken Loach in his Cannes award-winning film The Wind That Shakes The Barley.

A powerful indictment of British imperialism, it features the fortunes of a family split asunder by the British-led civil war of 1922-3 that rent Ireland apart, leaving a scar that has never healed.

Naturally, our right-wing press was up in arms, led by the Daily Mail, accusing Loach of treason, simply because he put on screen images that have been well-founded in history.

Then, it was the Black and Tans terrorising the countryside in the name of the king. Now, it's Blair playing soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan, never realising for one moment the legacy of resentment.

There were a few more releases by British producers that signal a new interest in realism, not least Andrea Arnold's sombre portrait of urban alienation Red Road.

Kate Dickie has put her marker down for any future films, with a powerful portrayal of a security worker who lives life watching people on her CCTV screens, until, one day, she's shocked out of her sloth.

Suffice to say, she sees somebody who played a part in her life and she goes in search of an answer, tracking her man down only to discover that cameras don't tell the whole truth.

Paul Andrew Wilson also takes us on a trip to the underside of life in London to Brighton, a powerful criminal drama that proves that there is still life after Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels.

Lorraine Stanley and Georgina Groome play two girls on the run from a vengeful gangster, the story pointing up the pains associated with homelessness, prostitution and child abuse.

More light-hearted but equally as socially relevant was Penny Woolcock's Mischief Night, a contemporary fable set in two ghettos in Leeds, one inhabited by Bengalis, the other by working-class whites.

Mischief Night is the north's equivalent to Halloween, a day when the locals are supposed to turn the world upside down.

So, the residents of Beeston decide to do just that, by joining forces against the common enemy.

Obviously, such films have been ignored by the posher press - they opted for Stephen Frears's The Queen, an Ealing-style comedy fleshing out the royal family's attempt to rubbish the memory of the so-called 'people's princess.'

It has a fine central performance from Helen Mirren, but the pity is that she gives the impression that Her Mag has a personality, even if she had to be prompted to display common humanity by a grinning Mr Blair.

My, how times have changed. Now we might appreciate V For Vendetta, a satirical take on a latter-day Guy Fawkes who leads a one-man campaign to incite the masses to attack parliament.

The scene in which the people converge on the building designed by Charles Barry and Augustus Pugin is truly inspiring. Parliament explodes in a kaleidoscope of colour.

Memories of Mischief Night come to mind. Still, my favourite memory from an interesting year in films is the sight of Penelope Cruz strutting her stuff in Pedro Amodovar's amazing Volver.

A tribute to working-class women everywhere, it shows Almodovar back on top form. The rumours are that they'll be doing it all again in a cinema near you in the coming year. Let's hope so.

As for the turkey of the year, that has to go to the truly dreadful Da Vinci Code.

From Morning Star