The Men Who Stare At Goats (M). Running time: 93 minutes. Director: Grant Heslov. Starring: George Clooney, Ewan McGregor, Jeff Bridges, Kevin SpaceyIt's a question for the ages: Can George Clooney act? Detractors suggest he always simply 'plays himself'. But it's hard to think of more than one role (and the less said about his stint as Batman the better) in which he has not been, at the very least, perfectly credible. That in itself is no small feat.
That's particularly true when the character in question is a middle aged former military man who believes he has psychic superpowers. Who claims to be able to become invisible or block a punch with just the power of his mind, and who activates his powers by listening to American rock band Boston's '70s hit 'More Than A Feeling'. In The Men Who Stare at Goats, Clooney brings not only credibility, but even dignity, to just such a ludicrous character.
Lyn Cassady was part of a secret military unit in the late 1970s, the New Earth Army (NEA), led by khaki-clad hippie Bill Django (Bridges), which aimed to harness the abilities of 'gifted' soldiers. They were trained to walk through walls, communicate telepathically, and kill goats with the power of their minds. So says Cassady.
He imparts these secrets to lovelorn young investigative journalist Bob Wilton (McGregor). Wilton is skeptical but, vulnerable in his current heartbroken state and desperate to reaffirm his manhood, he accompanies Cassady on a bizarre quest into the deepest deserts of present day, US-occupied Iraq.
The plot cuts back and forth between their oddball road trip and the fraught history of the NEA; from Django's New Age conversion on the battle fields of Vietnam (he noticed that the human instinct to not kill was so strong that new soldiers would deliberately aim their weapons over the enemy's head) to the NEA's idealistic inception and LSD fuelled training exercises, to its eventual implosion due to infiltration by certain overly-ambitious forces.
As you can probably guess, The Men Who Stare at Goats is silly. I say 'silly' using my best, clipped, Graham-Chapman-in-starchy-military-attire impersonation. It's the sort of absurd, hilarious silliness you might attribute to Monty Python and their ilk. All the actors commit wholeheartedly to this spirit of silliness.In a demonstration to the NEA of the power of mind over matter, one guest guru hooks a weight to his genitals and holds