War Machine

GoMovieReviews Rating: ★★★☆ (3.2/5)

Rated: TBA

Directed by: Patrick Hughes

Written by: Patrick Hughes, James Beaufort

Produced by: Todd Lieberman, Alex Young, Patrick Hughes

Starring: Alan Ritchson, Dennis Quaid, Stephan James, Jai Courtney, Esai Morales, Keiynan Lonsdale, Daniel Webber.

‘Don’t fuck’n quit.’

There’s a lot to like about, War Machine: an emotional arc held steady by number 81 (Alan Ritchson).  An army ranger.  Finally, an army ranger, whom after many attempts makes it to, The Death March.

Opening on an ominous shot of a night sky, full of stars, army jeeps cruise through the dust of an Afghan landscape.

Matching tattoos of ‘DFQ’ brothers, 81 and brother played by Jai Courtney, swear they’ll apply for RASP (Ranger Assessment and Selection Program) to join the 75^th Ranger Regiment.

It doesn’t take long for the film to introduce some army action when the unit is hit by the Taliban changing 81’s life forever.

Fast forward two years and all 81 can think about is crossing that line at the end of The Death March in memory of his brother.

So that’s what he focusses on.  Finishing without realising it’s only the beginning.  There’s that emotional arc.  But with more to the story because what starts as an assessment program becomes the army-ranges-to-be fight against a machine they don’t recognise.  A machine from another world.

As stated by director, Patrick Hughes at the Melbourne Premiere, War Machine is based on a nightmare.

Originally inspired by seeing soldiers running through the main street of an Australian country town at 2am, training to be part of the SAS (Special Air Service), Patrick originally thought he’d make a sports movie.  But it was a nightmare that led him to create a sci-fi to then become, War Machine.

I wondered if there was a comment of, we can still beat the machines, as an underlying drive to the film.  But that familiarly of machines in society made the monster, not so scary.  Relentlessness is the fear, with an almost predator-esq technology that seeks out its prey.  So War Machine came across as more a techie action film, than sci-fi.

Action movies can be cheesy, so I appreciated the restraint here from Alan Ritcher so I could swallow the bro-ship.  And there’s good support here, 15 (Blake Richardson) providing comic relief, and there’s some female input with 44 (Alex King) keeping her cool.  I liked 44.  Not trying hard to prove anything, just another part of the team.

With difficulty building tension with the machine-monster not overly scary, War Machine still managed to be a decent action film because the story came full circle with enough explosions and guts to keep the film entertaining.