Have to admit I was skeptical about “The Hurt Locker” despite all the rave reviews. Hadn’t I already seen a bunch of less-than-satisfying Iraq War movies? And when was the last time I enjoyed a Kathryn Bigelow movie – “Point Break”? That was 1991.

Happily, this was one movie that lived up to the hype. “The Hurt Locker” lays waste to all its Iraq war predecessors, and it does so in a straight-ahead manner lacking overt Hollywood sentimentality or symbolism. Watching the movie you get a sense of the dread, danger and uncertainty of war.

In that way, the movie reminded me of “Platoon.” But “The Hurt Locker” is much more dialed back; there are no operatic battles for the soul of a wide-eyed grunt in this movie. Sure, there are goners – war is hell, after all – but Bigelow spares sentimental foreshadowing so common in war movies. This just adds to the “will they or won’t they” suspense when the soldiers are out in the field waiting for Jeremy Renner’s bomb specialist to defuse explosives.

Summit is releasing the movie very carefully – it took a month before it expanded to the South Bay – but so far the strategy seems to be working. The pic earned $1.4 million from 238 theaters over the weekend, a big tick up from the previous frame.

One big surprise: My Friday afternoon aud skewed about 70/30 male/female. Given the rhapsodic reviews, I thought cinephiles of both genders would eagerly turn out. It’s definitely worth a look.