Guy Beres

Over the course of late 2006 and early 2007 I discovered The West Wing in a big way, and promptly watched my way through all seven seasons of the groundbreaking political drama series. Aaron Sorkin is therefore a name in television production, in my book, that deserves considerable respect. As a result, the prospect of seeing Charlie Wilson’s War (Sorkin wrote the screenplay) for the princely sum of £3.50 at the Coronet cinema in Notting Hill yesterday evening was something I didn’t have to think about too much.

The film is based on real events, although obviously with a bit of literary license at work. Tom Hanks plays Charlie Wilson, the Texas congressman who played a major role in committing the United States government to a covert war in Afghanistan against the Soviet Union. Julia Roberts is Joanne Herring, a wealthy and religious Wilson donor who has her own evangelical reasons for pushing Wilson towards doing something about Afghanistan. Philip Seymour Hoffman plays the somewhat challengingly named Gust Avrokotos, a CIA agent assigned to the Afghanistan desk who becomes increasingly intertwined with the story as Wilson begins pushing to double (and double again, and again) funding for the US backed weapons provision to the mujahideen.The movie has been billed as satirical, although to be honest, the satire button is not as firmly pressed as I would have liked. The film is more of a political drama that occasionally threatens to become satirical, but never quite makes the leap. The actors are all solid, although that said, it is not at all surprising that Hoffman was the only actor of the “big three” in this movie who has been nominated for an Oscar – his performance in this film is superb. He is the best “big name” actor in Hollywood by a country mile at the present time. It is good to see Hanks in a role somewhat removed from his usual “average joe” good guy characters, but having said that, he probably plays it all a bit too nice and convivial. As for Roberts – she unfortunately is fairly unconvincing in her role. I am not sure whether her own completely opposite political sympathies contributed to it, but I just don’t buy her as a wealthy Republican religious nut from Texas.

With his screenplay, Sorkin has obviously been very tempted to make a hard political point about the repercussions of Wilson’s actions in Afghanistan, but has steered away from that path. The criticism of the path the US government took ( e.g. training and giving weapons to the mujahideen) is fairly muted, and the movie itself probably is more celebratory of Wilson’s role in the episode than critical. Having said that, if you are interested in politics, liked the West Wing, or are an admirer of Philip Seymour Hoffman’s work, you have a reason to go see this film. Intelligent political drama does not come cheap or frequently these days, and this one is certainly bright, even if I am not sure it really makes the firm points it could have about what happened in Afghanistan.

One wonders where in the Australian film industry we can unearth an Australian Aaron Sorkin. Or are Australians to jaded with their political scene to produce such a figure?

This entry was posted on Saturday, January 26th, 2008 at 11:29 pm and is filed under Film. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.