War Dogs

If you like wolf of wall street, I believe you are gonna like this movie too, even though it not have all the funny moments. The plot is similar a nice guy (Teller) find a way to make money doing stuff located on the line of legal and illegal. The music was well chosen for every scene, acting (specially from Hill and Cooper) was outstanding. On the contrary if you though that Wolf.. didn't show enough all the people who suffer from their actions, and that the movie glorifies bad actions and the eternal search for money, you will not like this movie. It all depends in the end of your personal standards of what can be made fun of, and what subjects are too controversial (in this case, war, guns and arms dealers) to have a good time with.

The story is eye opening, relevant and very clearly told with a humorous tone through the serious subject matter. This is based on a true story with some fictionalized elements to make it entertaining. A massage therapist links up with a childhood friend who is a small time arms dealer. Very interesting to get a look at the legal but morally questionable world of arms dealing. I thought this would be a juvenile buddy movie with a bit of war thrown in but it isn't.

Jonah Hill has some funny lines and he does a great job with the over the top character but he can be subtly sinister when he needs to be. Miles Teller plays his character sympathetically and I liked him here. Quite different from the rather annoying characters he usually plays. Bradley Cooper who produced the movie and has a small but pivotal role and he is effective as an arms dealer.

Quite a transporting experience as the action takes you from Miami to Jordan and Iraq with some funny situations there and Albania.

Watch this movie. It deserves to do better than it has so far.

I don't know enough about the original story to determine the accuracy of Todd Phillips's "War Dogs", but it's an enjoyable movie. The tricks pulled by David Packouz and Efraim Diveroli just go to show that the people in the business of weapons have no principles (even violating arms embargoes). They're out to make money by any means necessary. To be certain, the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq proved quite profitable for weapons manufacturers. The mistake that Packouz and Diveroli made was getting caught.

It's not a masterpiece, but it does a respectable job showing the degrees to which these types go to enrich themselves. A very slimy world indeed.

Similar tone to Whiskey Tango Foxtrot, It was a lot more serious than what I expected after seeing the trailer. It's not the first time I've seen either Miles Teller or Jonah Hill in something more dramatic, I just may have assumed their first real outing together in a movie would be more of a straight up comedy.

Semi based on a true story of two young guys from Miami who became arms dealers, Miles Teller narrates the story of how David Packouz teamed up with this best friend from the tenth grade, Efraim Diveroli and got in too over his head.

I was expecting more comedy from the two rather than just two young stars being entertaining. The movie is not disappointing with the team of Teller and Hill. If you are a fan of either one of these guys you are going to love the film.

Jonah Hill gives a performance that seem to be something between what he did in 21 Jump Street and the Wolf of Wall Street. The part just fits him so well as he plays a con man who tries to be everyone to everything on the outside but is really evil in the inside, and no matter how much you discover about his evil, Hill still makes the character likable.

But the likability is more met for Miles Teller, who Hill is supporting with greatness. Teller plays the sympathetic role of a man whose lost in his life at a time when his girl is about to have a baby, and he needs the money.

Director, Todd Phillips weaves a story about how people have profited from the war, and done bad things to profit from a bad war. It's almost like the Big Short, with it's explanation about how the arms game really works, but I always felt that the actual story was getting overshadow by the personalities of the two stars worthy of watching.

But overall, It is a very funny film and very entertaining, thanks to the Hill, Teller combo

http://cinemagardens.com

Right off the bat the best part of this movie is the acting: Teller and Hill have great chemistry on screen. Jonah does a particularly good job at playing the "guy you love to hate". I can't attest to the faithfulness of their portrayal of the real life people since I don't know anything about them. The rest of the cast does a great job as well.

The marketing for this movie was, unfortunately, deceitful: the trailer made it out to be this upbeat, funny, over the top comedy - which it's not. In reality the movie has a much slower pace, not a lot of situational humor and is certainly not filled with hilarious quips (the bulk of which are in the trailer). This is not to say that the movie was bad or not at all funny, it just wasn't what I expected (and I am sure I'm not alone).

My final critique will go unnoticed for the majority of viewers but I found it personally offensive so I have to report it: some of the movie takes place in Albania, only the set for Albania is actually Romania. Which is fine, I understand that they probably did this for practical reasons and as a Romanian movie goer I just have to accept it (we all recognized it immediately though). However, at some point in the movie an "Albanian" woman says something, only she says it in Romanian. This may not seem like much but it totally took me out of the movie and ruined the experience for me. I find it completely unacceptable that they could not hire an Albanian to say those few lines. The two languages might seem interchangeable to the rest of the world, I am sure, but that was very much NOT the case for me and everyone else in the theater.

I am a paying movie goer as well and I expect to be just as entertained as everyone else. This is, of course, not the first time that I've seen this in a film. But when a producer does something like this it shows me that they don't respect their movie, so they can't expect me to.

My rating, however, is not based on this final bit of criticism. I gave it a 7/10 for slow pacing and lack of humor, which is the opposite of what I expected.

I'd still recommend it, just don't expect to be blown away.

After watching it for a second time I decided to change my original rating from 7/10 to 8/10, mainly because the acting is just great and I respect the fact that the movie made me think about it and made me want to see it again.