Quirky Premise, Clunky Execution

Rating: 6/10 (10 November 2009)

Watching Grant Heslov's "The Men Who Stare at Goats" was tantamount to staring at a stick of dynamite - for 93 minutes - that never exploded. All the critical mass of a quirky, eccentric comedy (i.e., an able cast, a political pseudo-relevance) seemed to be undercut by clunky writing, tacky 'Watch people fall down, get run over, and laugh' stunts, and a painfully disjointed plot which can barely be deemed a plot at all. Rather, the movie featured more of a direction: an ill-defined, ill-conceived mission toward which two characters (Clooney's Lyn Cassady and McGregor's Bob Wilton) floated. The problem with the loose plot development, in this case, is that Clooney's chemistry with McGregor feels forced and their connection in the film equally contrived. The film was peppered with flashback (to which Bridges and Spacey owe the majority of their on-screen time) which jettisoned any chance the viewer had with feeling an investment toward the central story or its characters. In fact, the film stumbles from character to character so often that the viewer is caught juggling them under the central story arc -- and we never really care about most of them in the first place.
"The Men Who Stare at Goats" allows for some laughs and some admirable situational ironies. But don't expect the brilliance and subtlety of "The Big Lebowski" or "American Beauty."