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10/18/08
War, Inc. (2008)
29
%
Tomatometer
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Reviews Counted:77
Fresh:22
Rotten:55
Average Rating:4.5/10
Consensus: War, Inc. attempts to satirize the military industrial complex, but more often than not it misses its target.
Runtime: 1 hr 47 mins
Genre: Comedies
Synopsis: John Cusack plays an assassin in the star-filled satire that takes aim at war. Joan Cusack, Marisa Tomei, Hilary Duff, and Ben Kingsley also star.
Starring: John Cusack, Hilary Duff, Marisa Tomei, Joan Cusack
Director: Joshua Seftel
Reviews for War, Inc.
Challenges the corrupt military-industrial complex and privatization with such an embarrassingly generic, dated, fish-in-a-barrel aplomb that it's no wonder David Mamet denounced his former life as a "brain-dead liberal."
05/22/08
War, Inc. squanders some top-tier talent (Marisa Tomei, Sir Ben Kingsley) as well as our patience.
10/18/08
This dog doesn't do enough wagging.
05/23/08
Any random five minutes from lefty talk-radio hosts Rachel Maddow's or Randi Rhodes' shows would provide more entertainment and deeper insight into current events.
05/20/08
It is as though the cast and scriptwriters are constantly nodding to one another and admiring their own cleverness.
06/14/08
...there's plenty of material ripe for savage satire out in the world right now, and while I approve of the targets War, Inc. took aim at, I can't say that it ever scored a direct hit.
06/29/08
The politics of War, Inc. are not problematic so much as pedestrian. There's nothing new in embracing the anti-conservative screed to show how off kilter the country really is.
05/23/08
Even less funny than Southland Tales and not nearly as adventurous.
05/22/08
Its comedy too often blunders into meaningless slapstick, with bombs and bloodshed replacing pratfalls and pies in the face.
06/13/08
Not dumb and definitely bold, War, Inc. is too shrill and nervous to really hit its political targets effectively. The humor's dominant tone is curdled, when it needs to be wickedly caustic.
05/22/08
Nice try, but this hallucinatory polemic never jells.
07/14/08
The filmic equivalent of a bleating, hot microphone - all crossed wires and misfunneled energy.
05/27/08
Like the Iraq conflict itself, the exit strategy fails and the whole thing becomes a complete mess. And it wasn't that great an idea from the beginning.
06/13/08
What is supposed to be a sharp parody is so slow, we're always several steps ahead.
10/18/08
No matter how dark your sense of humor, the Bush Administration’s joke has become a harsh reality. There’s no spark of humor when you’re staring into an abyss.
05/09/08
Only occasionally hits the target.
07/03/08
This absurdist political farce has its moments but requires a deft touch for satire ... perhaps no one could have made the uneven script work.
07/30/09
A disastrously heavy-handed satire...
04/26/08
Despite the film's tongue-in-cheek nature, it's never really funny, throwing a lot of ideas into the mix and creating a convoluted story that's probably too smart for its own good.
05/23/08
Latest News for War, Inc.
January 21, 2009:
Razzies Name 2008's Worst Movie Nominees
No awards season would be complete without the Golden Raspberry Awards (AKA The Razzies), awarded each year to the very worst movies to hit Hollywood. This year's winners will... More...
June 28, 2008:
Cusack as a mercenary in bulltetproof designer suits and Hilary Duff doing a kinky Arab superstar sexpot shoving scorpions down her crotch, can't save this satire crossing the line between the chaos of war and the chaos of filmmaking. 
More...
June 23, 2008:
Ben Kingsley Is Everywhere
Think you're seeing Ben Kingsley everywhere lately? It's no optical illusion -- his roles in The Love Guru and The Wackness are just two of the many projects he's got lined up... More...
May 22, 2008:
RT Interview: Joan Cusack on War, Inc., the Unofficial Sequel to Grosse Point Blank
Joan Cusack and her little brother, John, have co-starred in ten films together since the early 1980s; this week they join forces again to skewer the military industrial... More...
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