The Men Who Stare at Goats

I really wanted to like The Men Who Stare at Goats. It has a couple of my favorite actors in it (GeorgeClooney and Jeff Bridges) and I love a good story about secret government research, especially when they're researching turning soldiers into "Jedi warriors." It all sounds promising, and turns out to be disappointing.

A strange series of events leads local reporter Bob Wilton (Ewan McGregor) from investigating a psychic in Michigan to trolling through Kuwait trying to find a story about the war in Iraq. A story he stumbles across, of Lyn Cassady (Clooney), a man trained as a psychic soldier (Jedi warrior) by the U.S. government during the 1980s. Lyn spins the tale of the founder of his unit, Bill Django (Bridges) and his wanderings through the America of the 1970s, trying to find the tools to create a new kind of soldier, a soldier that'd use peace to end war. Lost and confused, Bob follows Lyn into Iraq, on one last mission.

The Men Who Stare at Goats is the kind of film that makes me wish that the filmmakers had a better handle on what they were trying to do. It doesn't seem to know whether it's trying to be a parody of the vaguely science fictiony military psychic film, or if it's a serious examination of the war in Iraq, and the government at that time, or maybe it's a road movie, or a character piece about a seriously disturbed veteran. I just don't know what it was trying to be. It's just a jumbled mess of genres and tones that left me bored and disconnected.

At first I was really picking up what they were putting down. The flashbacks to Bill's travels and the founding of the "New Earth Army" were at turns hilarious and informative. It was a comedy that was squarely in my wheelhouse. I'd even take the awkward framing device of the McGregor/Clooney and the less than perfect pop culture references to get a shot of the hilarious comedy.

But the deeper into the film we got the more serious, and political, it became. Losing all sense of subtlety along the way (and most of its comic sensibility). Instead of a light comedy about the craziness surrounding the "NEA" there was all kinds of commentary on the war in Iraq, which didn't really jive with the flashbacks. Even the rivalry between Lyn and another member of his unit, Larry Hooper (Kevin Spacey) is hijacked into the present day storyline, with cringe worthy results. 

I think that I'd rather have seen a film entirely about Bill's journey, and the "NEA" than everything else that was crammed in here. At least that'd have been funny, and wouldn't have wasted quite a good performance from Jeff Bridges on only half of a decent movie.

Grade: C-