Whiskey Tango Foxtrot - directed by Glenn Ficarra & John Requa
Starring: Tina Fey, Martin Freeman, Margot Robbie, Billy Bob Thornton, Alfred Molina, Christopher Abbott, Nicholas Braun, Stephen Peacocke, Sheila Vand, Evan Jonigkeit, Josh Charles, Cherry Jones
Screenplay: Robert Carlock (based on Kim Barker's book)
Music Score by: Nick Urata
Cinematography: Xavier Grobet
Edited by: Jan Kovaci
Running Time: 112 minutes
Rated: TBC - Around an R16 for frequent profanity and some war violence
Based on a true story this movies opening title card tells us.
Kim Barker was the Chicago Tribune's South Asia Bureau Chief from 2004 to 2009 and covered many world changing events in her time embedded with U.S Troops in the Middle East- mainly Afghanistan.
She wrote a book called 'The Taliban Shuffle: Strange Days in Afghanistan and Pakistan' and it is on this that "Whiskey Tango Foxtrot" is based.
Tina Fey doesn't look much like the real Kim Barker (renamed here as Kim Baker) and I don't know if this film is an accurate portrayal of Barker's time in Afghanistan and more importantly if the tone of this movie is representative of the country post 9/11 but I did enjoy it.
Pitched as a comedy with that military phonetic WTF title and of course the presence of comedic talents Fey and Freeman this may seem an uncomfortable fit for a movie about the war in the Middle East.
Having directors Glenn Ficarra and John Requa at the helm does much to keep the tone balanced between the reality of war and the need to have a laugh.
The pair directed my favourite romantic comedy "Crazy, Stupid Love" and the less great but still slick and enjoyable "Focus" with Will Smith and Margot Robbie.
Robbie takes a role in "Whiskey Tango Foxtrot" too although she has far less screen time than I am happy with.
She does deliver the best line of the movie as she recommends that Kim take advantage of being one of the few attractive women around the security detail. I will not spoil the line here but trust me- you will know it when you hear it!
I like Robbie a lot - she is a genuine talent and has great charisma.
Fortunately these are traits even more applicable to Tina Fey and she is in all but a scant few shots.
This is her movie through and through.
Produced by Saturday Night Lives Lorne Michaels and written by 30 Rock / SNL / Unbreakbale Kimmy Schmidt writer Robert Carlock it appears to be very much a Tina Fey project from the get go.
Fine with me- I am a fan.
As Baker Fey arrives in Afghanistan very soon into the movie.
She is assigned a fixer- a local who is her guide and translator.
This man named Fahim played by Christopher Abbott is one of the highlights of the film.
He is a fascinating character - honest, honourable and as translator given to sanitising less savoury outbursts for Kim's benefit.
"Aw, suck my dick" shouts a man in the middle of a gunfire exchange and Fahim translates it as 'Oh, what an unfortunate event'
It's funny stuff but entirely pointless as Kim is as foul mouthed as any of the men around her.
Well, perhaps not Ian (Martin Freeman) who speaks in a symphony of F and C major.
He is set up early as a potential love interest as is Nick- Baker's former military security man.
Claiming to be a New Zealand SAS man he and Ian vie for the attention of Kim.
The romantic angle is not entirely a good fit and although it does provide for plenty of laughs it is at odds with some of the events going on around the parties involved.
So much so that a plot development late in the film seems almost out of place.
It affords a wonderful usage of the song 'Without You' by Harry Nilsson that had me smiling even though the scene in question was a tense one.
And so it is with this film - it bounces around in tone from liberal smatterings of one liners and ongoing motifs (dogs having sex at the edge of the frame) to tense scenes of war and death and tension.
It gets away with it by virtue of the funny bits being strong enough to make you forget that this is a tale of a country torn apart and a lot of people dying or in grave danger.
This is never more apparent than in parts featuring a scene stealing Billy Bob Thornton as Marine General Hollanek.
In one such moment a humvee convoy must stop road side in the middle of nowhere for Kim to pee.
Thornton is hilarious and so every appearance is welcome but again- that tone is in danger of being pushed too far into comedy to be entirely comfortable.
There are a couple of scenes that show some relatively graphic war footage for example.
I did find myself enjoying this movie a lot however.
Fey is brilliant as always and although underused Robbie is a delight.
Freeman employs a pretty decent Scots accent and there is a wonderfully odd turn from the great Alfred Molina as a local high ranking politician.
How much of this really happened and how close to these major players the real Baker was I don't know but this is a compelling, funny and slickly directed piece of entertainment.
It falls apart in the final twenty minutes with a clumsily tacked on ending that doesn't sit very well with the ninety minutes before it much like Ficarra and Requa's last movie "Focus" but it had generated enough good will and good humour by that point for me to call this well worth a look.
RATING: 75 / 100
CONCLUSION: An often uncomfortable balance between real war horror and potty mouthed (and very funny) banter this is good stuff but that ending needs to be stronger.
Screenplay: Robert Carlock (based on Kim Barker's book)
Music Score by: Nick Urata
Cinematography: Xavier Grobet
Edited by: Jan Kovaci
Running Time: 112 minutes
Rated: TBC - Around an R16 for frequent profanity and some war violence
Based on a true story this movies opening title card tells us.
Kim Barker was the Chicago Tribune's South Asia Bureau Chief from 2004 to 2009 and covered many world changing events in her time embedded with U.S Troops in the Middle East- mainly Afghanistan.
She wrote a book called 'The Taliban Shuffle: Strange Days in Afghanistan and Pakistan' and it is on this that "Whiskey Tango Foxtrot" is based.
Tina Fey doesn't look much like the real Kim Barker (renamed here as Kim Baker) and I don't know if this film is an accurate portrayal of Barker's time in Afghanistan and more importantly if the tone of this movie is representative of the country post 9/11 but I did enjoy it.
 |
| Martin Freem and Tina Fey |
Having directors Glenn Ficarra and John Requa at the helm does much to keep the tone balanced between the reality of war and the need to have a laugh.
The pair directed my favourite romantic comedy "Crazy, Stupid Love" and the less great but still slick and enjoyable "Focus" with Will Smith and Margot Robbie.
Robbie takes a role in "Whiskey Tango Foxtrot" too although she has far less screen time than I am happy with.
She does deliver the best line of the movie as she recommends that Kim take advantage of being one of the few attractive women around the security detail. I will not spoil the line here but trust me- you will know it when you hear it!
I like Robbie a lot - she is a genuine talent and has great charisma.
Fortunately these are traits even more applicable to Tina Fey and she is in all but a scant few shots.
This is her movie through and through.
Produced by Saturday Night Lives Lorne Michaels and written by 30 Rock / SNL / Unbreakbale Kimmy Schmidt writer Robert Carlock it appears to be very much a Tina Fey project from the get go.
Fine with me- I am a fan.
 |
| Billy Bob Thornton as General Hollanek, Christopher Abbott as Fahim and Nicholas Braun as Tall Brian |
She is assigned a fixer- a local who is her guide and translator.
This man named Fahim played by Christopher Abbott is one of the highlights of the film.
He is a fascinating character - honest, honourable and as translator given to sanitising less savoury outbursts for Kim's benefit.
"Aw, suck my dick" shouts a man in the middle of a gunfire exchange and Fahim translates it as 'Oh, what an unfortunate event'
It's funny stuff but entirely pointless as Kim is as foul mouthed as any of the men around her.
Well, perhaps not Ian (Martin Freeman) who speaks in a symphony of F and C major.
He is set up early as a potential love interest as is Nick- Baker's former military security man.
Claiming to be a New Zealand SAS man he and Ian vie for the attention of Kim.
The romantic angle is not entirely a good fit and although it does provide for plenty of laughs it is at odds with some of the events going on around the parties involved.
So much so that a plot development late in the film seems almost out of place.
It affords a wonderful usage of the song 'Without You' by Harry Nilsson that had me smiling even though the scene in question was a tense one.
And so it is with this film - it bounces around in tone from liberal smatterings of one liners and ongoing motifs (dogs having sex at the edge of the frame) to tense scenes of war and death and tension.
It gets away with it by virtue of the funny bits being strong enough to make you forget that this is a tale of a country torn apart and a lot of people dying or in grave danger.
 |
| Margot Robbie |
In one such moment a humvee convoy must stop road side in the middle of nowhere for Kim to pee.
Thornton is hilarious and so every appearance is welcome but again- that tone is in danger of being pushed too far into comedy to be entirely comfortable.
There are a couple of scenes that show some relatively graphic war footage for example.
I did find myself enjoying this movie a lot however.
Fey is brilliant as always and although underused Robbie is a delight.
Freeman employs a pretty decent Scots accent and there is a wonderfully odd turn from the great Alfred Molina as a local high ranking politician.
How much of this really happened and how close to these major players the real Baker was I don't know but this is a compelling, funny and slickly directed piece of entertainment.
It falls apart in the final twenty minutes with a clumsily tacked on ending that doesn't sit very well with the ninety minutes before it much like Ficarra and Requa's last movie "Focus" but it had generated enough good will and good humour by that point for me to call this well worth a look.
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