War Dogs (2016)

War Dogs (2016)

Dir: Todd Phillips

‘War is an economy’

War Dogs is the new film by Todd Phillips (The Hangover Trilogy) based on the real events of two young men embroiled in arms dealing for the US government during the Iraq War. The films opens with us being introduced to Miles Teller’s character David Packouz existing in his hand to mouth lifestyle, part time as a masseuse whilst hoping to start a business selling goods to care homes. Soon after he meets up with a childhood friend Efraim Diveroli (Jonah Hill), who reveals his involvement in the arms dealing business scavenging small deals and selling them off for profit. However these small deals with the US Army are in the thousands and as David begins to get a hand of the whole business strategy, the deals begin to grow into astronomical figures. But as both characters begin flying to close to the sun, with demand increasing for greater priced products, problems emerge that are then matched by bizarre and hilarious resolutions.

When working with a plot that involves arms dealing and rags to riches, the two films that come to mind are Andrew Niccol’s Lord of War and Brian De Palma’s Scarface. And War Dogs has nods to both films throughout. There is a constant thematic through line that echoes Scarface, with a large framed poster of Tony Montana in Efraim’s office and the themes of power madness. But when looking at the main plot point of arms dealing, Lord of War is the film that has all the components. Simply because if you have one of the best openings to any film in history, you know you’re in for a special time. The director however, Andrew Niccol, is a very political director/writer with his most notable films being The Truman Show and Simone which contain politically satirizing undertones. Lord of War is no different and has interesting writing, commentating on the entire gun trade. More specifically looking at the lucrative market in African warfare but finishing with a jab at the United States gun trafficking. Whilst Lord of War is satirically rich, War Dogs weaves subtle satirical threads consistently throughout the narrative which I found to be one of the highlights of the movie.

My main drawback though for this film is a simple one. If any of you have seen the Hangover films, you’ll know that there is a certain slickness to how it is shot, to amplify the amount of excess that goes on screen. Which works very well as we’ve seen with films like Wolf of Wall Street and American Hustle, that both accentuate the glamour through its cinematography. But for me that drew me out of the film as I never really felt the risk involved in their exploits.

I feel this is typified through their promotional poster, which is a carbon copy of Scarface but with more colour and vibrancy. And that perfectly summarises my point, because whilst Scarface is similar thematically it just has that relentless fear of looking over your shoulder for the sharks Tony Montana (Al Pacino) is now swimming with. Yet with War Dogs and its Icarus plot line, I always felt numb to their impending doom. Not to say it was gimmicky like the Hangover films, it just didn’t convey that serious tone I think would’ve helped. If it was shot in a more documentary style aesthetic with a depreciated visual quality, like Greengrass but tailed in a bit more, that would have subtly incorporated the authenticity or “realness” which would have raised the stakes for the characters.

However it is a small gripe of mine and does not take away that much from the overall picture because this film is really good. I feel it’s an injustice of Metacritic to give it a 57/100 because even though it flips back from drama to comedy, the performances are really good and the humour is on point. On a side note it is safe to say practically everything Jonah Hill is in, he always is one of the best parts of the film. Miles Teller proves again after a shaky patch that he does have the capacity to be a great actor. Whilst being slightly overshadowed by Jonah Hill, elements from his astonishing performance in Whiplash crept back in War Dogs. Plus the chemistry both Jonah and Miles have together is excellent and excels the film forward leading into the main positive for War Dogs, which is that the film is incredibly funny and that almost outweighs my gripe for the slickness.

In the end however this is a very effective comedy drama with great performances. I would highly recommend solely for Jonah Hill attempting his best impression of Jared Leto’s Joker laugh.