War, Inc.

37

First Look Studios ( minutes)
and Joshua Seftel
John Cusack , Hilary Duff , Marisa Tomei , Joan Cusack , Ben Kingsley , and Dan Aykroyd

Rating: R for violence, language and brief sexual material

Summary: War, Inc. is a political satire set in Turaqistan, a country occupied by an American private corporation run by a former U.S. Vice President. In an effort to monopolize the opportunities the warn-torn nation offers, the corporations CEO hires Hauser , a hit man, to kill a Middle Eastern oil minister. Now, struggling with his own growing demons, the assassin must pose as the corporation’s Trade Show Producer in order to pull off this latest hit, while maintaining his cover by organizing the high-profile wedding of Yonica Babyyeah, an outrageous Central Asian pop star and keeping a sexy left-wing reporter in check. (First Look Studios)

Peter Rainer
Christian Science Monitor:
(75) It's a bewildering mix of very smart and very dumb, but the cast, which also features a hilarious Joan Cusack, Ben Kingsley, Marisa Tomei, Dan Aykroyd as the Cheney-esque ex-vice president, and Hilary Duff as a Turaqistan airhead pop star, is tiptop.

J.R. Jones
Chicago Reader:
(70) Like so many satires in the Strangelove mold, this never comes close to working as a story, but its lampoon of U.S. imperialism and military privatization is so bracingly obnoxious I didn't really care.

Marc Mohan
Portland Oregonian:
(67) Comes up with some decent jokes, including a talking car-based GPS system which doubles as a therapist, and a suggestive Yonica number titled "I Want to Blow You Up," but fails to surround them with a compelling story or characters who rise above the level of cliche.

Claudia Puig
USA Today:
(63) Screwball, vaguely futuristic political satires are a rare hybrid, and War, Inc. is an intriguing, if flawed, example.

Michael Phillips
Chicago Tribune:
(63) This script bumps along, good ideas jostling with weak, derivative ones, and Seftel doesn't seem to know which way he wants to handle the material. Also, with Cusack playing yet another soul-fried wiseacre running on emotional autopilot, the piece doesn't have much of an engine.

Carina Chocano
Los Angeles Times:
(60) Somehow, what starts as a series of cheap shots in a barrel develops into something more, thanks largely to warm, engaging performances by Cusack and Tomei. War, Inc. is both right-on and somehow off, but it gets points for trying.

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