Tonight we saw “Charlie Wilson’s War” which we both enjoyed (what’s NOT to like about Tom Hanks?) but left us trying to figure out why we don’t remember anything about this whole event. When they talk about a covert war, they are quite serious because the information I’ve gleaned from the internet all indicates that the American public was shielded from these events and left in the dark about the U.S. involvement in Afghanistan in the 80’s. A good deal of it took place in 1986-88 when I recall fighting my own personal war with Starter Husband so I have a perfectly good excuse for being clueless (well, that, and the fact that 20+ years have gone by!) – but while the movie was a fictionalized version of the events, it was still fascinating to get a glimpse of politics in motion.
Philip Seymour Hoffman was brilliant, Julia Roberts had a small part and was so-so and it’s obvious Mike Nichols can never again match the brilliance he exhibited in “The Graduate” or “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?”. I did find the choice of music a bit intriguing – when the Afghans were blowing up the Russian helicopters and fixed wing planes with the ground to air weapons, they are accompanied by the sound of the “He Shall Purify” chorus from Handel’s Messiah. Clearly you had to know the music to understand the significance – and the irony!
