Charlie Wilson's War [2007] - Universal Pictures UK

Uncinematic story competently but blandly filmed

The film is not very good. It is simply not a very cinematic story, and it has not been dramatically filmed. It's just a bunch of people talking about funding a secret war, but with the intricacies of the politics and deceptions simplified to the point of rendering everything bland and dull.

An example: Hanks tells the President of Pakistan that he has probably broken the Logan Act in his dealings. The President asks what this is, Hanks does not explain. So most of the audience are left in the dark. As I have read the book I know that the Logan Act states that it is treason for anyone apart from the President of America to conduct foreign policy (ie. only the President can start a war, which is pretty much what Charlie Wilson has done by joining a war America is not fighting). If this was explained in the movie then it would have been dramatic and interesting, but instead it's brushed under the carpet rendering the scene dull. And don't get me started on how stinger missiles suddenly turn up in Afghanistan all of a sudden (in the book it takes about 300 pages of pleading and arguing before the government allowed them to be deployed).

The only good thing about the film are two scenes involving Philip Seymour Hoffman. The first scene where he has an argument with his boss and the scene where he meets Hanks for the first time. The rest of the film is a boring dud. I even fast-forwarded a few sequences as I knew what was happening and couldn't be bothered sitting through these predictable scenes.

I have read the book (5 stars) and I can say that it is much better than the film. I would, without any hesitation, recommend reading that instead of watching this.

NOTE: There is a patronising Aids documentary on the front of the disc that you cannot skip. I have found that it can be bypassed by selecting Dansk (Danish?) on the language select screen to go straight to the main menu, you'll just have to switch off the subtitles when the film starts.

Surprisingly good

I didn't think this would be anywhere near as enjoyable as it is. I really liked it, and found it to be surprisingly good.

Don't buy if you want to know what really happened

It's not a bad film as pure entertainment but, naturally, it depicts Americans as good (though flawed) and Russians as essentially evil. I should add that I'm no fan of the appalling Soviet Empire but we now know that, far from saving Afghanistan from Russia, the US government (and the CIA) provoked the Russian invasion as part of their Cold War strategy. Whether or not you think this policy was worthwhile in harming the Soviet Empire, the fact remains that Charlie Wilson's War totally ignores the real story. This from a 1998 interview (in a French publication) with Zbigniew Brzezinski, Jimmy Carter's National Security Advisor:

Q: When the Soviets justified their intervention by asserting that they intended to fight against a secret involvement of the United States in Afghanistan, people didn't believe them. However, there was a basis of truth. You don't regret anything today?

Brzezinski: Regret what? That secret operation was an excellent idea. It had the effect of drawing the Russians into the Afghan trap and you want me to regret it? The day that the Soviets officially crossed the border, I wrote to President Carter: We now have the opportunity of giving to the USSR its Vietnam war. Indeed, for almost 10 years, Moscow had to carry on a war unsupportable by the government, a conflict that brought about the demoralization and finally the breakup of the Soviet empire.

Q: And neither do you regret having supported the Islamic [integrisme], having given arms and advice to future terrorists?

Brzezinski: What is most important to the history of the world? The Taliban or the collapse of the Soviet empire? Some stirred-up Moslems or the liberation of Central Europe and the end of the cold war?

Surprisingly interesting movie!

Worth watching just for Hoffman's character, who manages to consistently upstage the two heavyweight leads of Hanks and Roberts. This guy is completely in the spirit and period of the movie and makes the other two look like they're hamming it up something rotten.

I initially rented this and assumed the unskippable advert was only on the rental copy - bit of a shameful oversight if it's on the bought version, I think.

Good but could have been better

I have to agree with the reviews on here, this film covers a very touchy subject and gives you an insight into American politics. A floored but good congressman (Hanks) stumbles into a war that he didn't know that much about, upon finding out the true story dedicates his career with the help of a wealthy texas woman (Roberts) to righting the injustice, and in steps another floored but honest character (Hoffman). However a 90 minute movie on such a subject when no-one would blink if it were 2 hours doesn't do it justice. I feel if they had gone a bit further it would have been so much better.........