The Men Who Stare at Goats a Funny, if Messy, Film

“The Men Who Stare at Goats” opens with the caption, “More of this is true than you would like to believe.” The power of belief is at the heart of this film, which in its own kooky way addresses the topic with relative sincerity. It works on two levels:

(1) The characters within the film are asked to believe in fantastical elements some would deem impossible, and

(2) we the audience are asked to believe that most of the implausible events in the film actually happened.
 
I am reminded of Mark Twain, who once said, “Never let the truth get in the way of a good story.” What really happened is not the point – it is what we believe that makes it so.
 
The title characters in “The Men Who Stare at Goats” are a group of U.S. soldiers called the First Earth Battalion who were trained to Jedi warriors who fight the enemies not with conventional weapons, but with their minds. A select group of higher-ups in the military (and allegedly President Reagan himself) believed that psychic powers could be harnessed and used against the Soviets.
 
The man with the most promising psychic powers is Lyn Cassady (George Clooney), who we learn actually killed a goat by staring at it (or so he believes). Most of the film takes place in 2003, years after the disbandment of the First Earth Battalion, with Cassady and an American reporter, Bob Wilton (Ewan McGregor), lost in Iraq with only Cassady’s psychic powers to guide them. Where the film goes I will not spoil for you, but if it’s not true, it stretches the limits of contrivance.
 
As a film, “The Men Who Stare at Goats” is an uneven one. The script is sophomoric, and the direction is messy and lacking focus. The film is constantly flashing back and forward, often in a jarring, disjointed fashion. The greatest sin of “The Men Who Stare at Goats” is not that it’s a bad film – it’s just terribly sloppy.
 
But I enjoyed “The Men Who Stare at Goats,” mostly due to the performance of George Clooney. He was completely convincing as a man teetering on the edge of brilliance and insanity. There are times when we actually believe his powers are real, and there are other times we just feel sorry for him. But most importantly, he’s a man no crazier than anyone else who believes in the unbelievable, and for that, we admire him.