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Tom Hanks plays wheeler-dealer congressman Charlie Wilson |
Charlie’s communist crackdown
CHARLIE WILSON'S WAR
Directed by Mike Nichols
Certificate 15
IT is always good to find Mike Nichols behind the cameras and to know that the old maestro, now 76, hasn’t lost his touch or his eye for detail – just look at the background action: every scene is a flawless nugget.
This time he leads with his chin and wades into the sensitive arena of Afghanistan in the 1980s, and America’s involvement when they funded the mujaheddin resistance fighters to the tune of $750 million for sophisticated arms to oust the invading Soviet army. Charlie Wilson (Tom Hanks), it seems, was the wheeler-dealer who made it all happen.
In hindsight we know that some of those weapons have been turned on the Allies today, after the US abandoned Afghanistan and allowed Osama Bin Laden to set up his base and plan the 9/11 attacks.
Watching turbaned warlords cheering Charlie and waving their guns in the air adds an uneasy postscript to a film which on the surface is a triumph, from its scintillating screenplay (Aaron Sorkin) to the performances of its trio of star names: Hanks, Julia Roberts and Philip Seymour Hoffman.
The story – unbelievable as it sounds – apparently is true, based around playboy congressman Wilson whose “good time Charlie” exterior masked a deep sense of injustice and a passion for the underdog.
In his uniquely powerful position on the Defence Appropriations Committee, which financed the CIA, he had massive influence and could move like a wraith through the corridors of power on Capitol Hill.
Charlie joins forces with a renegade CIA agent (Hoffman) and a rich Texan socialite “fixer” (Julia Roberts, dripping with sex appeal, jewellery and furs).
“I want you to deliver such a crushing defeat on the Soviets that Communism crumbles and in so doing ends the Cold War,” she tells him, summing up history in one crisp sentence.
“Yes, ma’am,” is Charlie’s only reply before they slip between the sheets in her luxury penthouse.
The film follows the unlikely trio as they travel the world to drum up support from shady arms dealers and a host of dubious characters, somehow creating alliances among Israelis, Egyptians and Pakistanis for the cause. Julia Roberts savours her sable-and-mink role to the full, stalking through her mansion with a pair of greyhounds at her heels and vitriol on her tongue, while Hoffman is in his element as the veteran CIA rebel.
Hanks submerges himself into his role with a chameleon’s skill, as a shameless womaniser and one of those seasoned chancers who win reluctant respect even from their enemies. (The real Charlie, it seems, is 74, alive and well and living in the US today.)
As for Nichols, he deftly weaves through the political minefield and adds a single final sentence flashed on the screen in Charlie Wilson’s words: “It was glorious. Then we screwed up the end game!”
So that’s what happened. |
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