The war according to Charlie Wilson, a film that bets on the intelligence of the spectator (critic)

In 2007, Mike Nichols joined Aaron Sorkins, Tom Hanks and Julia Roberts for his final film. To be reviewed this Sunday on Arte.

Who said they couldn’t bring down the Soviet Empire? The incredible but true story of a senator who liked to have a good time, of a world of Houston who devoted himself to good causes and a CIA agent who loved action. The trio conspired to set up the biggest secret operation of all time!

This Sunday, Arte devotes her evening to Julia Robertsbut not quite with his best known films. At 9 p.m., the channel will offer War according to Charlie Wilsonof Mike Nichols (The winner, Closer between consenting adults), then not Pretty Womanbut a documentary on the manufacture of this “Hollywood fairy tale”.

When it was released in France at the very beginning of 2008, First had appreciated this film written by Aaron Sorkin (The Social Network) and carried by a super casting: in addition to the actress who will receive at the end of the month The César of Honorthere is Tom Hanks, Amy Adams, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Emily Blunt … Here is our criticism.

All the philosophy of War according to Charlie Wilson is contained in an eastern proverb quoted by one of the characters. He says, in substance, that what passes for
Good news one day reveals a bad side the next day.

The film tells the crusade of a Texan senator who seeks to arm the Afghan resistance in the 1980s. For this purpose, he ensures the most improbable collaborations: a Catholic and lesser billionaire (Julia Roberts), a very bad spy Flawed (Philip Seymour Hoffman, definitely the best actor of contemporary composition), without forgetting the ironic association of an Egyptian diplomat and an Israeli arms dealer. The good news is that Wilson can raise the necessary money, helping to undo the Soviet army. The bad news is not explicitly stated, but the spectator deduces it easily: twenty years later, thanks to the weapons funded by Charlie Wilson, the Muslim fundamentalists control the whole region.

Drawing on an extremely entertaining script for the scriptwriter Aaron Sorkin, the veteran Mike Nichols describes, in satirical mode, with lucidity and without exaggeration, a quantity of real characters. Much more than the causticity of his first films (Catch-2270), the filmmaker is linked to the tradition of the best American comedies of the 1950s, whose dialogues with small onions gave pride of place to interpreters.

In fact, Tom Hanks has rarely been so sympathetic, in the role of this picturesque politician as a hedonist private life does not prevent politics with wisdom and generosity. At a time when producers format cinema according to the reductive idea they have of the public, this film is an anomaly by betting on the intelligence of the spectator. This is good news …

Is Mike Nichols bigger than the winner?