| Charlie Wilson's War (Widescreen) | 
 enlarge | Director: Mike Nichols
Actors: Tom Hanks, Julia Roberts, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Amy Adams, Ned Beatty
Studio: Universal Studios
Category: DVD
List Price: $29.98
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Avg. Customer Rating:  120 reviews
Sales Rank: 196
Format: Widescreen, Ntsc
Languages: Arabic (Original Language), English (Original Language), Russian (Original Language), English (Subtitled), Spanish (Subtitled), French (Subtitled), French (Dubbed), Spanish (Dubbed)
Rating: R (Restricted)
Running Time: 102 minutes
Number Of Items: 1
Aspect Ratio: 1.85:1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.2
Dimensions (in): 7.5 x 5.1 x 0.6
MPN: 61100566
UPC: 025195004848
EAN: 0025195004848
ASIN: B0013XZ2QK
Theatrical Release Date: December 21, 2007
Release Date: April 22, 2008
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Condition: FREE FIRST CLASS UPGRADE AND DELIVERY CONFIRMATION! We guarantee all of our movies to play. May have been previous rental.
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| Customer Reviews:
 Charlie Wilson's War January 24, 2008
1 out of 3 found this review helpful
I highly recommend it as both entertaining and profound in its message. As you watch it, try substituting "NATO & American forces" every time "The Soviet Union Army" is mentioned and "Christians" for "Communists" and it becomes even clearer why Bush has us on a mission impossible.
 Should have been re-scripted and called "Ronald Reagan's War" January 23, 2008
8 out of 21 found this review helpful
Charlie Wilson was an important player in helping to rid Afghanistan of the Soviets, but history shows it was Ronald Reagan and his team, Bill Casey in the CIA, etc., who were the constant and most powerful organizing agents to send the missiles to shoot down Soviet helicopters, and who established policy directives to make the Soviets pay a high price for their invasion and barbarism in Afghanistan -- which was but one facet of the COMINTERN's push for world domination, of the Cold War. The movie doesn't go into this aspect, but that's typical Hollywood leftism, not to mention the 100 million victims of communist atrocity during the 20th Century. A good summary article on this is "Hollywood's Sins of Omission" By: Dr. Paul Kengor, which can easily be found on internet. Hollywood typically screws up history (just look at the seditious conduct of many top stars), either trying to make the Americans the bad-guys of history and current events, twisting history to make a celebrity star appear more heroic by making his enemy more villainous (as in Mel Gibson's "The Patriot", where a British officer was falsely tarnished as a mass-murderer of civilians), Speilberg's inserting the obligatory American soldier machine-gunning captured German prisoners at Normandy (the reverse happened many times, in fact), or outright falsely claiming Americans accomplished things -- as with the rescuing of the Enigma machine from a captured Nazi U-boat -- which actually was an heroic mission pulled off by the British. The lesson is, don't trust your history or current-events to Hollywood and the glamor-crowd.
Be Careful What You Ask For January 21, 2008
4 out of 5 found this review helpful
This is a very good film. It is well written and well acted and even Julia Roberts does pretty good in her role although miscast. Tom Hanks does an excellent job as Charlie Wilson but the star performance goes to Hoffman who plays the CIA agent. There is no attempt to portray Wilson as heroic or to minimize his sleaze. Perhaps the best and most realistic scene in the film is the audience with Prsident Zia. This is a short scene but very blunt and to the point. It is followed by the watershed event which is the visit to the refugee camp. From this point on the film sort of coasts to its climax, which is the withdrawal of the mighty Red Army.
The issue I have with this film is its narrowness. It fails to give any reason for the incursion by the Russians other than raw Imperialism. It fails to show the Mujahadeen for what they truly were radical Islamofascists rather than the freedom fighters portrayed. General Zia has a small role but the fact that he himself was a radical Muslim who introduced Sharia Law as the law of the land is ignored. The fact that he laid the foundation for subsequent events in Afghanistan by his radical Islamic beliefs and pandering to the radical Muslims is not mentioned. These oversights may not be totally relevant to Charlie Wilson but they are relevant to subsequent events. Charlie Wilson is portrayed as a flawed -- well greatly flawed -- person and one of little depth. He never understood or even tried to understand the actual situation, he only saw the suffering, which he blamed exclusively on the Russians. So the film is very well done, entertaining, and well worth watching, but it fails to address the ramifications of Charlie's intercession in events that he really didn't understand. So it is a good film but very narrow in its focus. Charlie Wilson did a good deed but it is well worth remembering that no good deed goes unpunished. We are still suffering from Charlie's good heart and lack of strategic vision.
Entertaining, but hopelessly inaccurate January 14, 2008
15 out of 26 found this review helpful
I'm going out on a limb here as most people adore the film. As an entertaining movie it's okay.
While I'm as far from a prude as humanly possible, one may question Wilson's morality; you may recall the system did that with Bill Clinton to the point that they kept him occupied with it for years. The film brushed aside Wilson's goings-on with some women of dubious moral stature, particularly the filthy rich, ultra-right woman, played by Julia Roberts, who funded many of Wilson's endeavors--and in whom he indulged. The film just brushed aside this behavior, as if it were nothing more than a public relations blunder. I feel uncomfortable with that brush off, as it's what would cause much of the general public to challenge Wilson's stature right off.
(The Washington Post had a lengthy piece on Wilson just about the time the film came out, confirming much of that behavior, though questioning some details, e.g., the cleavage of some of Wilson's staff.)
Other reviewers have gone over the themes of the film so I won't reiterate them. At the end of the film, I was concerned--uncomfortable-- that there was minimal attention paid to the consequences of the Afghanistan maneuvers. Has anyone heard of a Saudi civil engineer and economist by the name of Osama bin Laden? He's one of the consequences. Or "the base?" (In Arabic Al Qaeda?) Another consequence.
So I felt uncomfortable with the film without, frankly, much detail on why I felt that way. Then I was sent a review by Chalmers Johnson in which he referred to the film as an "Imperialist Comedy." Johnson took my discomfort and put far more substance to it. For instance, what I didn't know is that the US involvement in Afghanistan took place before the USSR had invaded. It was an attempt to bring a self-destructive, Vietnam-type experience to the Soviets. While that's at least dubious legally, if not illegal, it's something that needs to be discussed, not disregarged as the film did.
Further, Wilson did all this conspiring without a word from his colleagues or consituency. In this, a democracy? Hmmm. Do your own thing, I guess.
Aaron Sorkin, who wrote the screenplay, had originally included a line from CIA operative Gus Avrakotos, played very well by Phillip Seymour Hoffman, which goes, "Remember I said this: There's going to be a day when we're gonna look back and say, 'I'd give anything if [Afghanistan] were overrun with Godless communists.'" That line was elimated from the script.
So the consequences of the US/Israeli involvement were barely covered by the film, though it's a preoccupation of a country today--one by which we can find ourselves victims with no culpability for those consequences.
In short, the film didn't address the blowback of what we'd done, and at least implicitly makes a hero out of a man who did his own thing despite the consequences. We can get on the "get them Russians" bandwagon, while as usual ignoring the US experiences in Vietnam and elsewhere. We can laugh at what Wilson got away with, relative to a president who was in office at the same time. But, while we sold the Afghans some missiles to counter the technically superior Soviets, there WERE consequences for which we continue to pay. And the film barely touched them.
The picture just got bigger January 13, 2008
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
A fantastic movie on all levels. Not only are the performances sleek and inspired, but there is a refreshing element of everydayness that makes the whole account watchable and enjoyable while retaining its seriousness. The gravity of the whole issue is not allowed to weigh the movie down, and the cheekiness of the presentation does not trivialise any of its messages. A perfect balance has been struck that delivers its message loud and clear.
It is important to notice that this movie transcends partisanship by extending itself into the real world. Specifically, the movie lacks an ending; even though it follows the war of the Afghan nation against the Soviets, showing how the US got involved, all the way to the defeat of the Soviets and even slightly beyond that, it stops there and does not follow through. And here lies the genius of this movie, simple and laconic: it gives us no ending. There in no proper ending to this movie, for the ending is out there, in the real world. We are actually left to understand the turn of events on our own, through the aftereffects of what the movie has shown happen twenty years ago, and to make up our minds as such. We are left to close the movie up with our own personal experience of the repercussions of what happened out there, and we are left to do it on our own and without lectures or cheesy endings.
And the best part of all is that when the DVD is released in a few months time, we will still have an ending for Charlie Wilson's War. While this may make this movie difficult to comprehend in its entirety, say, fifty years from now, it makes it perfectly relevant now, and allows the real world to explain the movie, just as this movie tries to explain the real world. Brilliant reciprocity. What a way to make a statement. Even if the events are not entirely comprehensive, it's a great statement to make. Great storytelling. An effective way to touch a nerve or two. It'll incite hot questions and make an individual realise that defending democracy involves more than just arms. It involves brains, balls, vision, and an appreciation of the bigger picture, which were unfortunately absent in this tremendous case. And so not only was the monumental opportunity of fanning the winds of democracy and modernity in a medievally-functioning country squandered, but they were also tragically reversed into a backdraft that is now burning away right in front of our faces, inside our pockets, and down our children's future.
Charlie Wilson's War shows us exactly how idealism, zealotry, business-making, or just plain hype, can turn from blessing in disguise to an acrimonious curse, and may have a thing or two to teach us... if we take a little time after the movie is over and look around a bit.
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