In early April 2006, Private First Class Angel "Sally" Salazar (Izzy Diaz), a young United States Army soldier serving in the Iraq War, is an aspiring filmmaker who enlisted in the U.S. Army to help him get into film school, following the rejection of his application to University of Southern California. Salazar, based in Camp "The Oven" Carolina, near Samarra, Iraq, is using his camcorder to record an amateur documentary, "Tell Me No Lies", about his deployment in Samarra, to present to a film school of his choice as part of his future enrollment there as a student. Meanwhile, a French documentary crew is shooting a documentary called "Barrage" while they are embedded with Salazar's platoon.