George Clooney is charming; Kevin Spacey is villainous and Jeff Bridges is funny. But don’t go to “Men Who Stare at Goats”. You saw all the funny parts already if you saw more than one commercial for the film, so let me spoil the ending. The “good guys” put LSD into the water and chow of American troops in Iraq and release a bunch of terrorists from jail to the happy sounds of 1960s style music. Then the two main characters steal a helicopter and fly off.
At the cinema, they also featured the trailer for another movie to avoid. It featured Natalie Portman as the wife of a soldier who disappears in Afghanistan. She proceeds to sleep with his brother. The guy is found alive and comes back home and goes crazy. It seems to me to be part of the usual crazy veteran movie. Don’t go.
So far, Hollywood has produced a steady stream of bad movies related to Iraq and Afghanistan. They don’t make money, but they keep on making them. “Men Who Stare at Goats” is a kind of stealth trashing. You might not recognize it as such from the trailers or the television commercials. I liked all the actors. The idea of the movie is interesting and amusing. They could have just made a funny movie, but they chose to go with the tired old political crap. It sucks. Don’t go.