Review of War Dogs (2016) by Thequietgamer — 21 Dec 2016

A pretty good job at telling a story based on true events. Don't get me wrong, you can totally tell real things that actually happened were glossed over(where did they get the guns in the first place?), changed, or just left out to make for a more widely pleasing movie. At it's core though the tale is still interesting. Not too mention we get two fantastic performances from Jonah Hill and Miles Teller.

In the end War Dogs ends up being a better drama than comedy. Quite frankly, it's nowhere near as funny as those trailers let on. Part of this has to do with subject matters serious nature. Mainly though, it's an issue of timing. It's simply off. The witty and quick lines the characters are given rarely hit that right note to make you laugh out loud. You'll still chuckle, but there are plenty of times where the jokes just fly by because you are too caught up in what's going on with the actual plot.

The plot itself has a few stumbles of it's own. For starters, it's really hard to care about these two characters. They're just too big of scumbags to root for. They're occasionally dumb decisions don't help either. You're supposed to be able to possibly sympathize with Teller's character, but not even looks into his family life make that possible. So essentially we're just watching two not very likable people getting involved in some very interesting scenarios that aren't quite as funny as we hoped. Normally, that would be the death of a movie like this. However War Dogs just barely manages to get by thanks to the inherently compelling nature of the events it is based on. I, for one, found myself pushing past myself and increasingly getting more and more involved with the events. Fans of "based on a true story" movies can likely find their fix here.

So in the end it's a disappointing, but passable movie. One that could have been executed better, but still proves to be watchable and usually entertaining thanks to the great, true source material. Overall it may leave you wanting more, but it won't leave you feeling like you totally wasted your time or anything.

6.