The Men Who Stare At Goats

Directed by Grant Heslov. Written by Peter Straughan and Jon Ronson. Starring George Clooney, Ewan McGregor, Kevin Spacey, and Jeff Bridges.

BBC Films - 2009

Three Stars of Review! ***

When a woman breaks a man's heart he generally does one of two things: He either slips into depression and becomes a crippled lump or he puts himself behind something, and with all of his might and very little caution, he pursues that thing. This is a film about what happens when that thing is strange as hell.

Bob Wilton's wife has left him for his editor. Rather than resigning and moving on with his life Bob decides to go to Iraq. There's a war on, as we already know, but he spends most of his time drinking at a hotel bar, waiting for an opportunity to make it to the front lines.

It's here he meets Lyn Cassady, a man who claims to be a “Jedi,” and formerly part of a secret branch of the U.S. Military whose job it was to land behind enemy lines and use their psychic abilities to spread love and not war. We are informed they can confuse and control a man with a stare, they can find the location of a person thousands of miles away, and might even be able to walk through walls. Lyn is supposedly going into the battle zone in order to negotiate a waste disposal contract, and Bob convinces Lyn to let him tag along... or is it Lyn that convinces Bob?

From here on out the story is broken into two parts. We follow Bob and Lyn as they make their way through Iraq, getting into more than their fair share of trouble, while breaking things up with flashbacks chronicling the birth and death of the psychic warrior program.

You see some one in the chain of command read a book claiming that the Russians heard a rumor that the U.S. was developing a spoon bending force of super soldiers. This apparently was a little joke played by the French, but none the less those Russkies are working on a program of their own (supposedly), and America has to get there first.

It's all funnier than I expected, but not as funny as I had hoped. Jeff Bridges as Bill Jango is essentially doing “The Dude,” Kevin Spacey and George Clooney are terrific, and Ewan McGregor is funny and does a passable American accent. It's plenty of hard hitting absurdity with minimal drag.

If there's any kind of statement being made here it isn't shoved into your face like so many other war themed films that have come out in the last eight years. Given that it's based off of a book written by a “Guardian” alumni I doubt the credibility of the source the material, but lets just say I wouldn't be surprised if a good chunk of this was true. What would surprise me is if this was the weirdest thing America's government, or any government for that matter, had tried. It's a fun and light hearted anti-Americanism.

Currently in theaters.