Perfect cast and a good story

A Masterpiece!

It's a feast for the eyes. But what really makes this dramedy work is the acting.

The movie really just wants to entertain people.

Early 1980s. Charlie Wilson is a relatively unimportant and unproductive Texas congressman. He does have one advantage - he is on two important committees, covering foreign and military policy. He learns of the situation in Afghanistan and how the Russians are treating the Afghanis and is determined to help, through providing the Mujahideen with weapons. This sets in motion an unlikely sequence of deals and alliances. Excellent movie. Covers an important series of events in world history, the short-term consequences of which were positive, the long term less so. Does so in very light, funny fashion. This highlights the farcicalness of some of the events, and helps the story move along. It would have been a very dry movie if it was entirely serious.Despite the non-seriousness of much of the movie, has a very powerful and profound final message.Great acting by Tom Hanks, Julia Roberts and, especially, Philip Seymour Hoffman.

The subtext of this film is that Charlie Wilson's War is still raging in Afghanistan but the USA has replaced the Soviets because they allowed a vacuum to develop in a country after the the Soviet withdrawal where the Taliban amongst other groups stepped in.Writer Aaron Sorkin and director Mike Nichols should have gone for dark, subversive satire with Charlie Wilson, a Democrat congressman from Texas known for some good time partying who somehow built an alliance that led to a covert military campaign to arm the Mujahideen in 1980s Afghanistan and repel the Soviet invaders.What we get is a strained, anaemic film with broad and uneven comedy that barely hits any targets and just about carried by the charm of its star, Tom Hanks helped by Philip Seymour Hoffman's blue collar, truculent CIA operative with Julia Roberts as a wealthy socialite and anti commie Texan with an array of international connections that helps Wilson.Maybe current events in the Middle East at the time this film was made meant that it had to pull its punches and come across as wishy washy.

I am astonished that they went to the trouble of making this movie in spite of the revelations after the 9-11 tragedy. There is no acknowledgment that the funding of the Afghan rebels led directly to the formation of Al-Qaeda and all that followed. Maybe Wilson et al, are indirectly responsible for all that?So, I now wonder how these people, Wilson and Herring especially, can look themselves in the mirror or show their faces in public. Or maybe America would rather gloat over their "victory" over the Soviets?But there is merit in the writing, some great gags, some subtle twists, some quotable lines, the saddest being at the very end, where there is a tiny hint that maybe it might not really achieve what they all thought it was going to.

Charlie Wilson's War is based off true events which led to the downfall of the Soviet Union and perhaps the rise of the Taliban in Afghanistan. But instead of making the film a complete political drama, I liked the boldness of the filmmakers by changing the film to more of a political satire. The movie was often funny and it consists of witty, explosive dialogue tanks to the genius writing of Aaron Sorkin. However, I feel that the movie is just way too talkative and the narrative tends to drag on at points.Mike Nichol's film is about a U.S Representative named Charlie Wilson who has been investigated for his party habits. But he pulls his act together by befriending a CIA man in charge of the happenings between the Soviet Union and Afghanistan named Gus. Together along with the help of a rich romantic interest of Charlie, Joanne Herring, they work together to participate in the downfall of the Soviet Union.The acting is really good, as one could expect with this sort of cast. It's weird to see Tom Hanks play a party person, but he pulls it off very well. Julia Roberts is excellent as his cold, rich love interest. Philip Seymour Hoffman, as always, is a great pleasure to watch. Finally, Amy Adams is magnificent as Charlie's assistant, always eager to live up to Charlie.Overall, Charlie Wilson's War is an engaging political satire about the events surrounding the Soviet Union's defeat and it shows how this was truly the beginning of the long drawn-out affair between the Taliban and the United States which would culminate during the 9/11 attacks. But it was funny and the jokes are spot on. The script is unusually clever and it was well-directed by a very well-respected director. Other than some blandness at times, this was a good film. I rate this film 8/10.