Sadly, a terrible film

Rating: 4/10 (18 November 2009)

Despite the cast and promising beginnings, the film loses its way about 40 minutes in; and there is quite a lot wrong with it really. The story is told through flashbacks, except the narrator (Ewan McGregor) is not the owner of the flashback (Clooney), which was a real problem for me (you keep wondering how McGregor knows all this detail if he wasn't there). The story itself meanders along self-consciously, with one or two decent laughs along the way; however it is very disjointed; the psychic military unit is somewhat lame (the trial scene in the trailer is the best bit to be honest) and then for reasons not made clear Kevin Spacey's character is supposed to be playing a major part in the plot development, but you never really get to understand why. Possibly there are a lot of 'in' military jokes, but if so I didn't get them. The trip into Iraq is more like something from a sketch show, with a nice little satire on private US contractors (but so what) and then what seems like a lot of footage to fill time until you get to the psychic unit's encampment. The ending is frankly ridiculous (why don't they fly off into the sunset...that's a good idea...). Anyone expecting a film to compare with the Cohen brothers should look elsewhere, despite the great cast. What were they thinking of when they agreed to star in this very average film?