War Dogs

Dir: Todd Phillips

2016

****

War Dogs is based on the true story of Efraim Diveroli and David Packouz, two young entrepreneurs with a penchant for marijuana and a thirst for success. After an incident regarding arms contracts was deemed corrupt in the early 2000's, The US government decided to let smaller companies bid on military contracts to seem fairer. The government would simply post orders for military equipment on a public website where anyone can place bids on filling the orders. Diveroli, who had already made money buying impounded arms at police auctions and selling them on at a profit, decided he would look for the small orders that larger contractors wouldn't bother with and place bids on them. These orders were small fry to the big companies but worth millions of dollars to independent contractors. Packouz joined Diveroli's company AEY Inc. early on and the pair formed a successful partnership. Although the film is largely fictionalized, the basics are true. The two men do exist, they did all the things they are shown to have done in the film apart from drive a truck load of guns to Iraq - they didn't do that, another pair of young gun runners who were doing what they were did around the same time. Packouz was a Licensed Massage Therapist, they both lived in Miami, Diveroli stole from his uncle, he had a drug problem, took unnecessary risks etc. The time-frame might be out and things may not have happened quite the way as is portrayed but essentially it is the truth. The biggest truth of the film however is revealed in the very first line of dialogue. War isn't about freedom, patriotism or any of the other nonsense reasons that governments give, it is poorly about the economy and, as Packouz says, if you say that isn't true then you are either part of it or ignorant. Boom. The film had my attention from then on. I read Todd Phillips and Jonah Hill and expected a comedy, a dark comedy, a stoner comedy, a comedy none the less but this was far from amusing and it never tried to be. It's dark subject matter and never pretended to be anything but. I think the pair could have been shown a little more as the unethical, amoral and grubby little opportunists that they were but their crimes were made clear. I would argue that Packouz gets off lightly (in real life as well as in the film's representation of him), his brief cameo speaks volumes, especially as it has him on stage singing and playing guitar - given that his new venture is music technology. The performance come close to overshadowing the facts in places but all in all it’s well balanced. It is indeed the various facts that keep the film going, like the fact that billions of dollars were confiscated by the US after the fall of Saddam - which they kept, and that it was very easy to fake documents and convince government officials of their competence and fictional history. It was the fact that the pair offered a naively low bid on the big contract that ended up finishing them that convinced the government, always money first. The biggest lesson was that of the millions of weapons that were stashed throughout Eastern Europe, ready for a war with the west. When the Cold War ended, and the immediate threat of violence subsided, arms dealers started moving these vast amounts of weapons. The sales that followed formed the "grey market" where legitimate government sanctioned buyers could procure arms illegally. Essentially, the Pentagon needed access to this new aftermarket in order to arm the militias it was creating in Iraq and Afghanistan. The trouble was, it couldn't go into such a murky underworld on its own. It needed proxies to do its dirty work — companies like AEY. They got themselves involved with dealers who were on terrorist watch lists and delved head-first in to a very murky world - one that would see them both sentenced. The argument that the governments were the real bad guys is fairly weak, it certainly doesn't make them any less guilty of amoral behaviour. Again, the film doesn't shy away from the bad stuff they both did, I think they did worse though that they just didn't show. It's an entertaining film, a real surprise from Todd Phillips I have to say, but it did leave a rather sour taste in my mouth. Given the subject matter that is exactly the reaction the audience should have, so I would that War Dogs is mission accomplished.