The Men Who Stare at Goats

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The Men Who Stare at Goats

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The Men Who Stare at Goats

George Clooney, Ewan McGregor, Jeff Bridges, Kevin Spacey, Stephen Lang

The story of a secret unit within the US Army called the First Earth Battalion, whose paranormal military ideas mutated over the decades to influence interrogation techniques at Guantanamo Bay.

Id: 11053838

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The Men Who Stare at Goats Recent Reviews
  • sheens431
    December 17, 2009
    sheens431
    I was pretty disappointed with this movie. With such an outstanding cast they could have done much more, but it continually falls short.

    I could see the humor in this movie; I know what they were trying for, but it never hit home with me. It has it's moments; chuckles here a...( read more)nd there. But overall the funny parts are just too obvious and the scenes I would have laughed at I had already seen in the trailer.

    The claim that this is all based on a true story doesn't really help clear anything up as this story makes very little sense to start with. I was expecting to see some guys killing goats with their minds and you never see that.

    There really isn't much of a reason to see this, but if you do at least wait until it's free.
  • allan913
    December 12, 2009
    allan913
    What a fantastic movie. It's smart, funny, original and very entertaining. A sharp and exhilerating piece of comic greatness. It's a flat-out hilarious great time at the movies that you will love. A clever, well-written, sharply directed and very well performend film with an A-Gr...( read more)ade all-star cast. Director, Grant Heslov has done an exceptional job with this material and its stars. George Clooney and Ewan McGregor are teriffic. Jeff Bridges is hilarious in so many ways. Kevin Spacey is brilliant. The cast has great chemistry together. A wonderful soundtrack and great set pieces. An outragious, enjoyable and outstanding film. A classic new comedy thats so unbeliveably fun and its even true.
  • flickfever
    December 4, 2009
    flickfever
    Picture
    The idea of psychic soldier sounds incredibly fascinating despite its ridiculousness. But in The Men Who Stare at Goats that ludicrous premise (or promise) is a thing of urban legend-cum-real-life-events. The clandestine program to program certain clairvoyance-gifted youn...( read more)g men depicted in this film is not a far cry from the actual programs that must've been in existence (and the cause of internal ridicule) in our arms forces' past.

    Ewan McGregor plays an American journalist bent on shaking off the remnants of a marriage gone wrong by actually doing something with his life. Therefore, he thinks of going to Iraq in the first weeks of the U.S.-led invasion in 2003. There he meets a wacked-out George Clooney (who is still recovering from his days as a psychic soldier from the Vietnam era.)

    What turns into a goal for a story about Iraq, turns into a search for the truth behind what is knows as "The Men Who Stare at Goats." Clooney's character proclaims that he and his colleagues were able to stop a goat's heart by staring at it (long enough) and that he possesses many other mind-control devices within his own mind. And that if the enemy (the soviets, Iraqis or whomever) were to find out about them--well, it would be the end of...the program.

    Sounds funny, right? Kind of? A little? Maybe not. The movie falls under the wretched spell of it brilliant casting (which also includes Jeff Bridges and Kevin Spacey) and muddles any semblance of gravitas with a plot so convoluted, complex and downright confusing that you'll be lost before you know it. It's not so much that the machinations of the characters are too difficult to keep up with. It's the fact that I couldn't care less about them.

    Their lives weren't that interesting and their military goals weren't compelling enough to merit an entire movie being made about them. Some quirky little episodes ensue (Clooney's wreckless "cloud-bursting" strands them in the desert) but, overall, the movie ends up feeling like an empty vehicle to display shiny, high paid actors like Space, Clooney and McGregor.

    Perhaps the concept of this movie was brilliant. I can't tell. But the execution of the film itself was dull and abrasive. It really said nothing new about the military now and it said nothing amusing about the military then. It seemed a little self-serving and inaccessible for the general population. Of course, I am not a pot-smoking hippie now and I certainly wasn't around when most young Americans were either. So, maybe I'm just out of touch.
  • 366weirdmovies
    December 2, 2009
    366weirdmovies
    A journalist accompanies an agent working for a secret, experimental psychic warfare Army unit (the Jedi Knights of the New Earth Army) on a mission deep into the Iraqi desert. Gets points for originality, but needed a lot more belly-laughs and a more satisfying conclusion. The ...( read more)star-studded cast (George Clooney, Ewan McGregor, Kevin Spacey and Jeff Bridges) don't go far enough over the top, often seeming wasted.
  • rebvodka042099
    November 22, 2009
    rebvodka042099
    This is one of the movies that audiences and critics disagree majorly upon. For me, it was just a waste of talent. If there was something I was "supposed" to get, I didn't. When you have McGregor, Clooney, Spacey and Bridges in one movie, you expect it to blow you away. Instead I...( read more) was left unemotional, uninterested, and with many question marks. Sure, the acting is superb, sure there is great black humor in it, but the story couldn't be one I cared less for, and even so, the movie SHOULD make you care for it. It seemed random and marked by carelessness, and it was a movie that I'd expect to see 20 years ago - not today. I didn't enjoy it much, and hopefully if the four of the leading stars ever get to be in a movie together again, it will be a masterpiece.
  • richardhayden1
    January 6, 2010
    richardhayden1
    George Clooney has never allowed his A-list status to get in the way of taking on unusual projects. He is not greatly concerned with the supposed safety of popcorn franchises, preferring to make the films he believes in. And it is hard to imagine that Jon Ronson's book The Men Wh...( read more)o Stare At Goats could possibly have transferred to the big screen without that sort of open-minded star power behind it.

    The book is a non-fiction exploration of the US Army's dalliance with the potential military application of paranormal powers, so called 'psychic spying'. The film adds a necessary narrative strand linking the historical sequences together and, if there is a weak point to the film, it lies in the thin road movie aspect of the plot.

    But it is a forgiveable device. Director, and long-time Clooney confederate, Grant Heslov knows the only way to demonstrate 30 years of farcical military programmes is to reveal it through flashbacks, a series of recollections made by Lyn Cassidy (Clooney) to desperate journalist Bob Wilton (Ewan McGregor) as they travel haphazardly through Iraq.

    The film's great success is in showing the absurdity of the programme, named the New Earth Army, inviting us to laugh loud and often at the self-denial and rampant egos on display. But it is the hints at the truth that make the absurdity work. Much of the New Earth Army's studies are revealed on screen in terms of basic slapstick, which is comically limited, until you realise that back in the 70s, on an unnamed Army base, young men devoted their careers to trying (and failing) to run through brick walls and other lunatic activities.

    As the two men progress through Iraq, so Lyn's tale of the psychic history of the military unfolds and more ridiculous characters arrive on the stage. But, the slapstick carries over to the road movie strand, which we know to be invention. The comedy falters here, despite heroic work from Clooney.

    In fact, the cast are without exception great. Clooney and Jeff Bridges (as the programme's founder Colonel Bill Django) get to glory in the naive belief that they are supermen, capable of mind-strikes and cloud-bursting, while Kevin Spacey (as the Judas-like Larry Hooper) glowers with pantomime menace as he dismantles the harmony of the New Earth Army. McGregor gamely holds his own but suffers from being the main invented character and forced into playing straight man to Clooney's Cassidy.

    As the film draws towards the end, it takes on a darker tone as the psychic experiments are shown to have been taken to their logical military conclusion and are being used to torture Iraqi prisoners. But this commentary on the effect of the military on science (even pseudo-science) is hurried along to make room for Wilton's redemption in a scene that, sadly, undoes a lot of the satire that goes before it.

    The Men Who Stare at Goats is fun and frequently daft with a little to say on the wastefulness that comes from huge military budgets and is carried across the finish line by excellent performances from all.
  • michaelcorleone
    January 4, 2010
    michaelcorleone
    I admire this movie for several reasons despite its faults. The main reason I admire it is the fact that it's surprising. It's legitimately offbeat in a charming way, and that's what lured me in. However, its weirdness and exceedingly over-the-top humor are only its superficial m...( read more)erits. This film is the vessel of a very troubling, very intelligent social satire. The implications of the material seem to be so elaborate that I feel like I missed a lot on a first viewing. Even dismissing that fact, it is hysterically funny and headlined by a cast of excellent actors. Clooney and McGregor are fantastic leads, but the supporting performances from Jeff Bridges and Kevin Spacey are the real stand-outs.
  • zandurian
    January 3, 2010
    zandurian
    Great stuff, I even liked Jeff Bridges.
  • elesterw
    December 30, 2009
    elesterw
    ...eh kinda cooky movie
  • cocoprincess18
    December 28, 2009
    cocoprincess18
    it was weird beyond reason but it was interesting and the chemistry btn the cast was great..
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