War Machine, 2026.
Directed by Patrick Hughes.
Starring Alan Ritchson, Dennis Quaid, Stephan James, Jai Courtney, Esai Morales, Blake Richardson, Keiynan Lonsdale, Daniel Webbe,r Jack Patten, Joshua Diaz, Heather Burridge, Victory Ndukwe, Matt Testro, and Richard Cottam.
SYNOPSIS:
Follow the final recruits of a grueling special ops boot camp who encounter a deadly force from beyond this world.
While it could be argued that War Machine is pro-military, it is, more importantly, pro-human, metaphorically and literally, in an absurdly rousing, crowd-pleasing fashion, as it follows U.S. Army Rangers in training against a sudden sentient machine invasion. That last bit is perhaps putting it kindly and avoiding the elephant in the room that Metal Gear Solid video game franchise creator Hideo Kojima probably has a plagiarism case to argue, as that’s exactly what these soldiers are up against here.
Expanding on that thought, co-writer/director Patrick Hughes’ (penning the screenplay alongside regular collaborator James Beaufort), conceptual thinking behind War Machine seems to have been a re-creation of the original Predator, but with a Metal Gear racing through the woods, firing ray beams capable of disintegrating human flesh and causing all kinds of gooey dismemberment and body-bursting. This is not a gripe; it is something anyone familiar with both of these IPs will likely realize they never knew they wanted until now. And in the year 2026, where originality is hard to come by, sometimes the unlikely meshing of tried-and-true ideas is more than enough to entertain, especially with rock-solid execution like this.
The pacing even resembles an old-school action thriller, unhurried and comfortable spending time with its human characters and, well, humanizing them with story and humor before the harbinger of death arrives. Here, that centers on Alan Ritchson playing an unnamed soldier, formally a combat engineer, before receiving a medal for a valiant effort to minimize casualties from an ambush in Kandahar. He doesn’t care about those heroics, though, and can’t even sleep at night, considering his brother (Jai Courtney) was one of those casualties. Together, they had a dream of becoming U.S. Army Rangers, which now has a new meaning: fulfilling a promise.
Upon arriving at the U.S. Army Rangers training base, everyone is assigned a number, which also doubles as their crediting character name here. Alan Ritchson’s beefy hunk of depression is given 81, but not before rejecting a lower number that would have denoted him as a team leader. He is a lone wolf, disinterested in working together, but rather proving something to himself, exercising demons, and making his brother proud from beyond the grave.
As par for the course with such films, 81 is surrounded by more experienced soldiers with wisdom to offer (Stephan James, comic relief jokesters (Blake Richardson), and even a head instructor who doesn’t believe he is ready to join the program (played by Dennis Quaid, who is presumably here because someone told him the invading robot was firing lasers that turned people woke). The supporting trainees strike a perfect balance between kill fodder and humanity; one anxiously awaits with glee to revel in the demise, but also with just enough personality to hope they make it through okay once the machine makes its grand entrance.
Between the initial tragic mission and the intensive weeks-long training, it’s worth mentioning again that the film does take some time establishing these familiar motivations and characters. For as corny as much of this is, that also turns out to not be a negative, as the tone, which is filled with urgent danger that anyone can be killed off next at any time, gradually threads the needle in adopting camp with Alan Ritchson delivering some gold one-liners (he knows exactly what kind of movie he is in at every stage of the running time) when it’s time to ditch survival and fight back. Seamlessly, many of the training drills come into play when the team is being hunted, creating a string of exhilarating sequences that give this experience the feel of a single long boss battle.
As mentioned, there is no getting around how cheesy some of this is, including a title that fits the bill for human and machine. Its emotional moments are more goofy than moving, and one could do without the sequel-baiting, given that any future installment would immediately betray why this one works as well as it does. However, War Machine is gloriously ridiculous while providing genuine thrills alongside grisly kills from immersive set pieces ranging from rolling down hills to sliding downstream to vehicular carnage.
Flickering Myth Rating – Film: ★ ★ ★ / Movie: ★ ★ ★ ★
Robert Kojder
