Whiskey Tango Foxtrot (2016)

Genre

Biography | Comedy | Drama | War

Directors

Glenn Ficarra | John Requa

Country

USA

Cast

Tina Fey, Margot Robbie, Martin Freeman, Christopher Abbott, Billy Bob Thornton, Alfred Molina, Sheila Vand, Nicholas Braun, Steve Peacocke, Evan Jonigkeit, Scott Takeda, Josh Charles, Cherry Jones, Sterling K. Brown, Thomas Kretschmann

Storyline

News copywriter Kim Baker (Tina Fey) decides to leave the comfort of a New York desk job to accept the assignment to work as on-camera war reporter in Afghanistan. 

Opinion

I am not a huge fan of war films but since this one is was supposed to be more of a comedy rather than a drama and it's directed by Glenn Ficarra and John Requa, the two guys who directed "Crazy, Stupid, Love." some years ago, I decided to give it a try. Was it worth it? It's complicated.

As for the black comedy part, "Whiskey Tango Foxtrot" is a decent and overall watchable film, as for the issue addreses, it is a pretty well done picture.

I don't know the real story so I am not able to make comparisons and I won't even look it up on the internet and pretend like I did know it. Instead I'm going to say that the story of this brave woman is quite interesting and that the storytelling flows quite well.

At some point though it got me worried because it felt like a drama pretending to be a comedy that was also asking us to sympathize with the main character who wasn't sympathetic at all. Just like happened in the dreadful "Eat Pray Love". But eventually the film showed off its well written character and mostly important, it addressed a serious issue that many don't even think about: that non-return point when a reporter gets used to the danger and that life on the razor's edge that ends up considering it normality, and that would do anything for an exclusive, even endanger their and the others lives. The filmmakers really did a good job at portraying the kind of addiction war can be for a reporter.

On the other hand there is the comedy. The film doesn't really work as such, but the good thing is that the drama is there and does work. And Tiny Fey gives a pretty solid performance in her dramatic role.