[img]7|left|||no_popup[/img]Timidity is rarely an attractive quality in either people or film, and The Men Who Stare At Goats features plenty of both. The film’s protagonist, a hapless but likeable sort thanks to Ewan McGregor’s easy-going appeal, floats along like driftwood with the currents of the plot, never truly affecting anything and learning only the flimsiest of life lessons. Journalist Bob Wilton is the sort of milquetoast who rages at his wife leaving him for his boss but, with all the docility of cattle, runs away to ruminate with the vague hopes of somehow winning his wife back. When presented with the quirky but interesting fact of a secret military unit set up to exploit paranormal skills, he tamely goes along with the only member of the unit, a gloriously mustachioed George Clooney, willing to share information. By the end, all that Bob has to show for trotting alongside Clooney’s Lyn Cassidy – in a blurry adventure to a vague destination – is a newly acquired devotion to New Age optimism. That, and a knowing wink at audiences stemming from Ewan McGregor’s past role in a galaxy far, far away.

At Least They Are Charming

If the film works at all, it’s because the cast submits audiences to an effective charm offensive that draws on additional support from Jeff Bridges as the free-spirited commanding officer of a psychic spy unit called the New Earth Army and Kevin Spacey as Cassidy’s jealous competition within the group. In the bigger picture, however, it becomes clear that not only does the film fail to draw blood from the multiple controversies it dredges up, it faints at the mere thought of blood. It brings in heavies like private contractors in Iraq, torture, and the effects of war, but offers paltry bleats of protests at the injustices it ostensibly satirizes (if that) and condemns. The film’s main gimmick, Army research into weaponizing alleged psychic phenomena, is similarly trivialized. Is psychic phenomena hooey? Is there something to it? The film takes the easy way out, refusing any kind of meaningful skepticism and embracing instead a bemused credulity. But even this credulity suffers from the film’s non-committal stance and preference for easy jokes over intellectual curiosity, a tonal confusion that gives the film the kind of hangover that follows an identity crisis. Like Bob Wilton, a wimpy investigative journalist, it doesn’t ask the hard questions. It merely buys into Django’s pleasant fluff and meanders through a thin, petering plot that involves Cassidy on a secret mission in Iraq. Not that there’s anything wrong with a belief in turning swords into ploughshares and spreading some good ol’ hippie lovin’ around; if only the script, based on a book by Jon Ronson, had the discipline to keep the plot focused on this or any of the many themes it toys with.

But the film is funny, for whatever that’s worth – like a popcorn movie with jokes instead of explosions and stunts.

Entertainment: ** (out of two).
Craft: * (out of two)

The Men Who Stare at Goats. Directed by Grant Heslov. Written by Peter Straughan, inspired by Jon Ronson's 2004 book. Starring George Clooney, Jeff Bridges, Ewan McGregor, Kevin Spacey, Robert Patrick, Stephen Lang and Stephen Root.93 minutes. Rated R (for language, some drug content and brief nudity).

Frédérik invites you to discuss The Men Who Stare at Goats at his blog www.inkandashes.net