War on Everyone
Irish filmmaker John Michael McDonagh delivers a politically incorrect cop movie that has one inspired performance but no discernible plot
Like a self-aware feature-length episode of Starsky & Hutch, John Michael McDonagh’s War on Everyone transfers the distinctively confrontational humour of both The Guard and Calvary into a 70s cop movie set in contemporary Albuquerque, New Mexico. Combining an often irritating degree of knowingness with a barrage of bloody shoot-outs and the music of Glen Campbell, this bittersweet tragicomedy boasts a stand-out performance from Michael Peña yet feels oddly deficient when balanced against the calibre of those involved in its production.
“I always wondered, if you hit a mime, does it make a sound?” These are the first words uttered by Terry (Alexander Skarsgård), a knuckle-headed battering ram of a cop who spends more time intoxicated than he does solving crimes. His wise-cracking partner Bob (Peña), meanwhile, displays the type of verbal dexterity audiences have come to expect from McDonagh’s band of eccentric characters – he's as comfortable debating Simone de Beauvoir with his wife as he is contemplating a mime’s dedication to his art.
Terry and Bob are terrible cops. They drive around in their 1970s muscle car taking bribes, abusing their power and even planting cocaine on potential informers. Things take a turn for the worst, however, when they try to intimidate James Mangan (Theo James), a British gangster with a penchant for opium and antique swords.
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Throughout the film, Terry and Bob find themselves in a series of situations that present them with moral conundrums. Yet with each opportunity to do the right thing, they manage to fall into the slither of grey that exists between good and evil. This moral complexity affords the film the opportunity to confront America’s continued problem with police brutality and racial typecasting, but McDonagh chooses instead to treat all his characters with the same level of contempt. In his efforts to wage war on everyone and create a comedy that prods and aggravates the current climate of political correctness, he unfortunately squanders the talents of Tessa Thompson and Stephanie Sigman – and War on Everyone is in desperate need of anything to temper its surfeit of unbridled testosterone.
When McDonagh's film is good, though, it’s very good, displaying both wit and charm as it delivers a succession of genuinely funny punch lines. Sadly, as we reach its final shoot-out, a complete lack of empathy for our affable yet undeveloped protagonists leaves us with a film evidently lacking in any discernible narrative. A comedy drunk on its own supply, War on Everyone is so intent on having fun that its plot feels almost secondary. The result is an overall tone that's too cartoonish, comprising none of the empathy evident in either The Guard or Cavalry.
By turns manic and exhausting, War on Everyone might feel more at home as a trim and tight television series. There are scenes of complete brilliance, with Peña delivering his lines with such finesse it feels like he’s the only one who truly ‘gets’ what McDonagh is trying to do; his character alone would be enough to make audiences tune in weekly. As charismatic as Peña is, however, his shoulders aren’t broad enough to carry a film that never quite coheres into one satisfying whole.
War on Everyone had its world premiere at Berlin Film Festival on 12 Feb and will be released in the UK later in the year