War Machine Review: 4 Ups & 5 Downs
Brad Pitt joins the Netflix gravy train.
War Machine is out now on Netflix, the streaming giant's latest effort to be taken seriously as a distributor of original movies, with the war satire boasting an all-star cast led by none other than Brad Pitt.
Though writer-director David Michôd's (Animal Kingdom, The Rover) effort certainly isn't bad, it disappointingly ends up settling for meme mediocrity, which doesn't exactly make it a ringing endorsement for the creative freedom Netflix reportedly affords its artists.
Still, you can watch it in the comfort of your bed right now without paying an extra penny, which should see it pull solid viewing figures regardless, and with that in mind, general audiences will probably be a lot easier on it than the critics.
With Netflix planning to roll out more and more original, star-studded movies throughout the rest of the year and beyond, War Machine is ultimately just a drop in the ocean. It could be better, sure, but it's definitely a start...
Downs...
5. The Supporting Cast Is Mostly Wasted
David Michôd has assembled quite the stellar cast indeed, though sadly, for the most part they're sparingly, forgettably used in favour of propping up Brad Pitt's oddball General Glen McMahon.
The likes of Ben Kingsley, Topher Grace, Anthony Michael Hall, Scoot McNairy, Will Poulter and Griffin Dunne appear intermittently throughout, though they're given pretty uninspired material to work through, and in the case of Kingsley in particular, could be cut out of the film entirely without it much effecting the end product.
It's clear that Netflix's collaboration with Brad Pitt's production company Plan B Entertainment resulted in a ton of money being thrown at the project, but where's the script that justifies hiring such a huge fleet of celebrated and well-liked actors?