He can report. But can he act?

Haas, who has a reputation for bringing a sense of place to even small-budget pictures, brought me in to play the bureau chief of a Baghdad-based photo agency, a minor character. Also in the way of full disclosure, I wasn't paid for my role and have no stake in the film.

Haas, whose last film "Up at the Villa," starring Sean Penn was well reviewed in this paper, is racing to have one of the first big-screen dramas released about America's war in Iraq. By Hollywood standards his $1 million budget is a shoe-string, provided by first-time producer Michael Sternberg and a partner.

The laconic Mr. Sternberg is probably the most relaxed man on the bustling set. After my first, bumbling attempts at my scene, I turn to him and say, "You've just watched your money go down the toilet, haven't you?" He puts an arm around my shoulder and says, "You'll be great, Dan."

The movie is at least one of two dramas about Iraq that are currently in the works, the other a big-budget look at the first battle for Fallujah set to star Harrison Ford. It's based on a book written by Bing West, a former assistant Defense secretary.

"The Situation" makes no claim to represent actual events in Iraq, but Haas is taking great care to get the look and feel of Iraq right. That's one reason he wanted someone like me around. I brought in some Baghdad posters to dress up a typical reporter's hotel rooms.

Getting ready to film a scene of the Iraqi photographer arriving at Baghdad's Hamra Hotel, where the Monitor's bureau was once located, two hulking Moroccan extras - who will act as hotel security guards - are being taught the proper military handling of AK-47s by a security adviser.

One look from Wendell and me, and the big fellas are out of the movie. Instead, we pick three scrawny men in T-shirts and ragged pants who are working on the set. I explain to them how to hold their rifles as if they are slightly absurd fashion accessories, rather than instruments of death. I ask the military adviser if the stocks on these particular AKs can be removed, conforming to Baghdad security-guard style. They can't.

"But why would anyone ever do that? You can't shoot straight that way," he says.

"That's Iraq," I tell him.

Getting it right in a movie like this is important to the people who have lived the real versions of war. Lewis, who played Captain Winters in "Band of Brothers," the series about the 101st Airborne in World War II, was recently approached by a soldier.

"Captain Winters,'' he asked.

"Well, if you like,'' said Lewis, who recounted the story to me. The man goes on to say that he was a Seabee (a naval engineer) working with Marines in southern Iraq last year, and though he thought he was there to work on reconstruction, the marines quickly handed him a rifle and reminded him that "this is combat."

During their down time, the men would gather around computers to watch DVDs of "Band of Brothers" over and over, and while watching a sequence recreating the Battle of Bastogne, they came under a persistent insurgent mortar barrage.

The soldier reached into his pocket and pulled out his dog-tags. "These kept me safe in Iraq, and I want you to have them.''

Lewis protested, "I'm just an actor." But the man put up a hand. "No, this is important to me. I want you to have this."

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