Review of Army of One (2016) by Patrick L — 16 Mar 2017

"Army of One is one of those movies that's so odd and strangely bad, you don't know what to say about it afterwards.".

DVD Movie Review: Army of One.

Date Viewed: December 5 2016.

Directed By Larry Charles (Borat, Bruno, Religulous and The Dictator).

Written By Rajiv Joseph and Scott Rothman.

Starring: Nicolas Cage, Wendi McLendon-Covey, Russell Brand, Rainn Wilson, Denis O'Hare, Paul Scheer, Will Sasso, Adrian Martinez and Matthew Modine.

Am I the only army of one who believes that Nicolas Cage's film career has finally gone down the toilet? Cage has a good comedic director and a great fictional true story at his disposal but he instantly destroys the movie's outrageous potential with his disastrously nutty performance. "Army of One" is based on the somewhat true story of an un-employed handyman from Colorado who really wanted to find and kill Osama Bin Laden himself.

Larry Charles (Borat, Bruno, The Dictator, Religulous) seemed like the perfect guy to direct outrageously true material like this and the script was an ingenious one but just like his haircuts and his ginormous debt he owes to the IRS, just about everything Nic Cage touches turns into bad news. I'll at least give Cage credit for letting himself go really loose but he apparently didn't do enough research on his character. Cage's Gary Faulkner is supposed to be this patriotic right-wing nut who really wanted to make his country proud by doing a noble cause but here he sounds like Bruce Dern if his lungs had collapsed and gone full Trump supporter nuts.

"Army of One" is one of those movies that's so odd and strangely bad, you don't know what to say about it afterwards. The plot revolves around ex-construction worker, Gary Faulkner (Cage) who's un-employed and his friend Pickles (Paul Scheer) kicks him out for being a layabout and well... crazy for his own good. Suddenly, Gary gets a vision from God (Russell Brand) who tells him that he delivered him to this world for a single purpose, find and kill Osama Bin Laden who is hiding in Pakistan.

As his quest begins, Gary purchases a sword he bought on a home-shopping network and he meets up with an old friend from high school, Marci Mitchell (Wendi McLendon-Covey). Gary has been smitten about her ever since and he even serves as a good substitute father for Marci's disabled daughter. After breaking numerous airport protocols, Gary lands in Pakistan where he hopes to find Bin Laden. Gary believes that his government will never find Bin Laden and he also thinks that they are hiding the truth from the American people. WOW! My mom thinks so too!

Gary makes some new friends in Pakistan and even does some marijuana with them but he gets looked after by government agents Doss (Denis O'Hare) and Simons (an unrecognizable Rainn Wilson) who believe that he will ruin everything they have covered in the region. So yeah, Faulker really wants to kill the most wanted man in the world, he has a best friend named Pickles and the God that's portrayed in this movie is British and he used to go out with Katy Perry. All of this is "REALLY CRAZY" but it doesn't matter to Gary because crazy is his middle name. I can accept that but what I don't accept is Nic Cage selecting one tailored-made direct-to-DVD clone after another.

The supporting players try their best to lift up this fictional material as high as they can from Cage's disastrous performance but unfortunately, he's on screen in almost every scene in "Army of One" which is fatal. As I said before, the screenplay by Rajiv Joseph and Scott Rothman (Draft Day) could've been ingenious, wise and funny but this bitterly noisy affair wore me down. "Army of One" marks itself as a total miscalculation from Nicolas Cage and director Larry Charles.

I'm sorry to mention this again but come on filmmakers! Russell Brand as God? What happened there? Was Morgan Freeman too busy? Nick Swardson wasn't available? Did Katt Williams get himself another DUI arrest?.