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(More customer reviews)Congressman Charlie Wilson from Lufkin, Texas, a ruggedly handsome man, who was a committed anti-Communist, with a few character flaws, who loved to have a good time, enjoyed alcohol and was a ladies' man ... became one of the unsung heros of the Afghanistan War. He was the only civilian to ever receive recognition and honor by the C.I.A. for his part in helping to drive the Russians out from Afghanistan. This film is based on the true stories written by the author George Crile in his book, "Charlie Wilson's War: The Extraordinary Story of How the Wildest Man in Congress and a Rogue CIA Agent Changed the History of Our Times". Essentially, there are two formulas to win this war on a global scale: the first is, "money + power = secret arms deals" and the second is, "clandestinely obtained weapons + motivated Afghani fighters = success". Serendipity often comes into play when success occurs on a global scale and Charlie Wilson seemed to benefit both from the unexpected and unknown ...
Charlie Wilson was sitting in a hot tub at Caesar's Palace with three young ladies, two of whom were strippers, and some male business partners, when he first saw Dan Rather on assignment in Afghanistan, presenting the plight of the mujahideen. Dan Rather described the difficulty they had fighting the Russians who had superior technology and arms. When he returned to Washington, he read the teletype from API, UPI, and Reuters and asked the C.I.A. how much was in their budget for clandestine operations in Afghanistan. He was told $5 million dollars, he quickly told them, "double it" [Charlie Wilson happened to be on the Senate Appropriations Committee]. From that point forward, Charlie Wilson was committed to helping free the Afghanistan people from Russian control ...
Tom Hanks does a superb job in playing the role of Charlie Wilson. At some point, he was contacted by Joanne Herring (played to perfection by Julia Roberts) who is a wealthy socialite from Texas who recently became a 'born again' Christian. She knew President Zia, the Prime Minister of Pakistan and arranged for Charlie Wilson to meet this Pakistani leader. He pled his case that the Afghanistan fighters needed better weapons to fight the Russians. He wanted the US to provide weapons *but* wanted Parkistan to control their distribution. More than 1/5 of the population of Afghanistan had escaped across the border to Pakistan and lived in squalid conditions due to the war with the Russians. At another point in the film, Charlie Wilson had a visit from Gust Avratakos, a rather independently minded C.I.A. agent [which got him into hot water with his superiors] ... who also had a stake in helping free Afghanistan. These two unlikely partners dealt in secret deals and meetings with an Israeli weapons and arms agent. They obtained the needed Stinger anti-aircraft missles for the Afghani fighters to use against the Russian bombers which turned the war around completely. At some point in the film, Charlie Wilson had gotten political and economic support from Doc Long, another Senator who had strong religious beliefs. He committed his total support to Charlie Wilson's position in this war.
While Charlie Wilson may be viewed as a flawed hero, he and Gust Avratakos single-handedly provided the weapons and arms needed by the mujahideen to win the war against the Russians. Amazingly enough, as time passed, the 10 million dollars initially committed to this clandestine venture turned into $500 million dollars. Few men can fund a pet program and spend money of this magnitude and get away with it. This film does a superb job of presenting the circumstances and particular events which showed how the nearly impossible became reality. In many ways and on many levels, the film presents events in too much of a simplistic and entertaining fashion, for which I deduct one star. No doubt, the book is more thorough and complete in providing the complex details which led to the success which Charlie Wilson and Gust Avratakos achieved. Nevertheless, this is a most enjoyable and well done film. Erika Borsos [pepper flower]
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Charlie Wilson's War (Widescreen) (2007)Academy Award® winners Tom Hanks, Julia Roberts and Philip Seymour Hoffman star in this compelling and witty film from Oscar®-winning director Mike Nichols and Primetime Emmy®-winning writer Aaron Sorkin (The West Wing). Based on the outrageous true story, Charlie Wilson's War shows how one congressman who loved a good time, one Houston socialite who loved a good cause and one renegade CIA agent who loved a good fight conspired to bring about the largest covert operation in history.
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