Dir. Mike Nichols, US, 2007, 102 mins
Cast: Tom Hanks, Julia Roberts, Philip Seymour Hoffman
Review by Carol Allen
Charlie Wilson is clearly a remarkable man. Long time Democrat Congressman for Texas and known as the "liberal from Lufkin" because of his support for the underdog, he was the man who instigated the US covert support for the Afghan freedom fighters in the eighties after the Russian invasion. Played in Nichols' film by Tom Hanks, he emerges as a colourful and charismatic character. A hedonist womaniser with a liking for Scotch and allegedly the odd spot of cocaine, his office is staffed entirely by beautiful girls, known predictably as the Angels. He is persuaded to take up the cause initially by wealthy anti communist Joanne Herring (Roberts). As a member of the appropriate defence committee, he persuades the government to give the Mujahideen some limited though inadequate support, but then he, Joanne and his allocated CIA support agent Gust Avrakotos (Hoffman) cook up a complex scheme involving an unlikely alliance of Israel, Pakistan and a belly dancer to up the action and drive the Russians out of Afghanistan.
Nichols and screenwriter Aaron Sorkin know the American political scene well and handle it with wit and verve. The film rattles along sometimes at the pace of a farce, as when Charlie and Gust, a gloriously grumpy blue collar Greek-American, who's looked down on by his Ivy League colleagues, are trying to have a meeting, which is constantly interrupted by the Angels, who are compiling a damage limitation strategy against an attempt to nail Charlie on a drugs charge. Hanks gives Charlie a wicked charm and Roberts as the elegant, bossy, born again Christian Joanne nails her character perfectly, with a rigidly perfect blonde hairdo and make-up that gives the impression of the perfect cosmetic surgery job. There are also good supporting performances from Amy Adams, as Charlie's feisty chief assistant and Om Puri as President Zia of Pakistan.
The story, however, is told very much from a patriotic American perspective, with Charlie as the buccaneering hero fighting for the persecuted Afghans. No mention is made of the uncomfortable fact that one of those who benefited from the CIA's arming and training of the Mujahideen was Osama bin Laden nor of the probability that the expulsion of the Russians assisted the rise of the Taliban. To a non-American audience in the light of today's situation there is a rather uneasy ring of jingoistic propaganda to the film. And when Charlie at the end, once the Russians have been driven out, is arguing for continued American involvement in Afghanistan to rebuild the country, while his motives are pure, it could also be seen by implication as an endorsement and justification for America's later involvement today both back in Afghanistan and in Iran. The filmmakers choose perhaps wisely to ignore the relationship of Charlie Wilson's war to these later complicated events in the interests of telling its tale.
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