No.246 : W.M.D (2013)

W.M.D. at the IMDb

You won’t of heard of this film, and I bet it doesn’t grace the C.V.s of its principals, but it’s out there and I sat through the whole 80 crappy minutes of it.

The film opens with a trio of soldiers walking is a desert which is supposed to be Iraq but looks suspiciously like California. One of them steps on a mine and after five minutes of chat they engineer a way to free him without the device going off. This scene has nothing to do with the rest of the film so it must have been shot to bump up the film’s run time or to show why our men may be damaged having served in a war zone. Or maybe they found an extra $5 in the budget and fancied a day out?

Anyway the film proper opens at a Baghdad military base on Thanksgiving, where the President is coming to visit. He isn’t named but he is dressed up like George W. Bush and references are made to his father also being President so if it’s not him it’s a pretty unoriginal new character!

The President makes a few glib jokes before a soldier pulls a gun and takes the President hostage. Unfortunately the fat and bomber jacket wearing ‘Secret Service Agents’ aren’t really on the ball and soon the President and four soldiers are holed up in the kitchen where the majority of the film takes place. The five are soon joined by a lady reporter and a cameraman and so begins a drawn out conversation where the rights and wrongs of the Gulf War are explored. If that sounds a bit dry, then that’s because it is.

The leader of the kidnappers, Garrison, is large and overbearing. As well as a loud, annoying and devoid of acting skills. He also has a semi-reluctant lady soldier with him as well as a dull one and a shouty random one. Like ‘The Rock’, from where much of the film is lifted, a rescue operation goes on whilst the President is interrogated and tortured by the soldiers who want answers for the motivations behind going to war and why their friends have been killed.

Will the President be saved and what sin will the media put on the events?

I really disliked this film and it was hard to see it through. It’s agenda was clear from the start and it was almost like liberal wish fulfillment with a Bush clone being made to atone for his sins. He gets his face fried, shoes thrown at him and is water boarded and you could almost hear the long haired liberals high fiving each other off camera. Take that Republicans!

The film closed with the tired old staple of various news outlets spinning the story as a Muslim atrocity while the stock ticker on screen shows share prices rising. It wasn’t subtle and definitely not objective. It was also very low budget, poorly acted and had no redeeming features whatsoever. One to avoid!

Best Bit : ‘How do you like your face cooked?’
‘W’ Rating - 2/23

No.194 : What Just Happened (2008)

What Just Happened at the IMDb

Another title missing some punctuation now as Hollywood has a good old laugh at itself - but are the viewers invited?

Robert De Niro stars as Ben, an A-list Hollywood producer who has problems piling up, both business and domestic. His new film ‘Fiercely’ starring Sean Penn has tested badly, mainly due to a dog being shot, and his English director is not keen on a re-cut. The studio boss, Catherine Keener, who was so nice to that virgin, is ready to take her scissors to the film while the director is about to fall off the wagon, a week short of his anniversary cake.

Meanwhile Ben’s next production is also sailing choppy waters as Bruce Willis is refusing to cut off his luxurious beard therefore losing his sex appeal and the studio’s support. Ben tries to get Willis’ agent John Turturro to rein in his star but he’s too much of a pussy to confront his biggest client. If that weren’t enough screenwriter Stanley Tucci may be shagging Ben’s ex-wife and an agent who recently killed himself may have been messing with his daughter, Kristen Stewart. It all sounds like some implausible bad movie!

The film opens as Ben takes his place at a Vanity Fair photo shot celebrating the most powerful producers in Hollywood. We have the familiar narrative device of some narration from the lead before we dissolve into the previous week’s events which are helpfully captioned ‘Monday’, ‘Tuesday’ etc. - a bit like my underpants.

Things start badly for Ben as his test screening elicits comment cards with less than complementary statements and indeed diagrams showing how much the film displeased the audience. Ben then has to smooth things out with the star, director and studio head in scenes unique to anyone who has never seen another film about the Hollywood system. In truth there are a few laughs especially with the OTT English director, played with a terrible accent by the Canadian Michael Wincott. Keener is good too as the studio head who is happy to take calls while on the throne but she was a bit too nice to convince as a heartless bitch, ready to spike any project that failed to meet her standards.

The second plot about Willis’ beard was less successful as it didn’t convince at all. I know it was meant to be an extreme perversion of reality, but at no point did Willis seem anything other than himself hamming it up. Away from the studio the home life stuff such as the running the kids to school and trying to get back with the ex-wife were a bit dull and I wasn’t really invested at all. I suppose when he’s getting easy sex from horny starlets it’s hard to be too sympathetic!

As the film played towards the Vanity Fair shoot where we joined the action not much had changed and I guess this was the intention of this ‘week in the life’ movie - it’s just always this crazy in Hollywood folks!

DeNiro is as likeable as always but you got the impression this was something cobbled together when he and a few pals found some time in their diaries - no doubt the Cannes scenes also matched their promotional schedules. It wasn’t too self indulgent however and the running time was kept at a bearable 90 minutes.

There are obvious comparisons to be made with ’The Player’ but it falls short of that in terms of humour and depth and is far below, on both counts, my favourite ’inside Hollywood’ flick ’The Big Picture’. Watch that instead - it’s got David St Hubbins in it.

Best Bit - Rob gets a reminder of the forgotten night before.  W Score 16/23

No.35 : War, Inc. (2008)

War Inc. at the IMDb

In the near future the American government puts the fighting of its wars out to private tender. When a local politician, for some reason called ‘Omar Sharif’, upsets their plans a middle eastern country, troubled hit man Brand Hauser is sent over to take him out.

Clearly things can’t be that simple so Brand is given the cover of an Expo organiser where he has to juggle the attentions of a precocious pop star (Hilary Duff) and an investigative reporter, Marisa Tomei. Brand has issues of his own that need the regular attention of his stroppy PR (sister Joan - again), his shrink and his suitcase full of hot sauce.

Things develop somewhat as he begins to doubt his motivations and gets conflicting emotions for the women in his life. All the while sinister forces are at work, all of which may affect the bottom line.





Despite a stellar cast that also includes the likes of Dan Ackroyd and Ben Kingsley this film had a ‘DVD Premiere’ in the US and it’s not hard to see why. Although some of the blurb describes it as a ‘satire’ it’d be more accurate to say ‘here is the war in Iraq through our Liberal viewpoint’. From the Halliburton like conglomerate orchestrating the war to the PR spin put on the news, not a obvious target is missed and then battered into nothingness with a sledgehammer.




Having Cusack as a hit man with his sister looking after his back is as lazy casting as you can imagine and why it wasn’t called ‘Grosse Point Blank 2’ can only be attributable to its complete lack of laughs, spirit or ‘80s soundtrack.

The big reveal at the end was pretty obvious as was Ben Kingley’s fate after we saw him in flashback getting squashed. They should have brought him back in the style of the real Omar Sharif in ‘Top Secret!’, but that would have been too funny and not preachy enough for this self righteous twaddle.


Best Bit : Kissy face with Marisa
‘W’ Score 11/23

No.25 : Wag the Dog (1997)

Wag the Dog at the IMDb

‘Wag the Dog’ is a 1997 political satire that boasts a host of stars including Robert DeNiro, Dustin Hoffman and Woody Harrelson.

The film opens eleven days before a presidential election and there’s trouble at the White House ; the President has been caught with his pants down. Before the story breaks spin doctor DeNiro hires Hollywood producer Hoffman to invent a war which will keep the scandal off the front pages. This task is successfully completed with the US’s phoney war against Albania helping the incumbent’s ratings no end.

Unfortunately William C Macy’s CIA agent hasn’t picked his new boss yet and details of the fiction are leaked to the opposition candidate. When he declares the war over the stakes are raised and a hero has to be found to save the day. He comes in the shape of Woody’s ‘Old Shoe’ - but have our guys bet on a lame horse?

With the election imminent the lost hero of the Albania conflict has to be showcased but the plane is going down and Woody’s record starts with ‘raped a nun’ and there’s an ‘and’ after that…

This film is a rare beast - a political satire that manages to be both witty and funny without hammering home some obvious message. The fictitious war and media spin seem so credible, even more so given recent events. The President who is never seen is portrayed almost as a puppet, happy to spew out any old story his agents give him.

The highlight of the film for me were the ‘Old Shoe’ scenes where packs of willing celebrities are happy to endorse and sing for a totally invented hero who has a less than distinguished past. I was slightly let down with the blacker than black finale, and I found it less than credible that Hoffman’s character would act with such, albeit self serving, integrity. That said in a film where the message is ‘image is everything’ maybe it wasn’t so far fetched.

Fast moving and without an ounce of fat on the plot or dialogue ‘Wag the Dog’ sets the benchmark for all political satires in the modern age. Just a pity Bill Clinton came along and made it look like a documentary!

Best Bit : Woody’s mental turn
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W’ Rating 19/23