War On Everyone review: “Entertaining, laugh-out-loud fun”

War On Everyone review: A film that you know you’re going to love from the opening frames.

A very entertaining, laugh-out-loud funny flick you are going to love. War On Everyone review by Paul Heath, February 2016.

War On Everyone comes to the screen courtesy of John Michael McDonaugh, the talented filmmaker behind the films Calvary and previously, the superb The Guard. This is the first film not to star Brendan Gleeson in the lead role. That honour this time falls to the feet of two talented, up and coming actors in Michael Pena, hot off of a movie-stealing turn in last summer’s Ant-Man, and Alexander Skarsgard.

War On Everyone focuses on the exploits of Pena and Skarsgard’s characters, Bob Bolero and Terry Monroe, two New Mexico cops who will do anything to get out of good old-fashioned police-work, and to top up their income by any means necessary – even if that means extortion, blackmail, or ripping off their own informants. This very, very black comedy puts a new spin on the buddy cop movie as the pair go after a missing $1 million – not with the intent on bringing the people that stole it to justice, but to line their own pockets. The hood behind the robbery appears to be a British ‘businessman,’ here played by Theo James, who might just prove to be a fly in the ointment as he refuses to put up with their less conventional police tactics.

McDonaugh has proven in just two movies that he has a very unique style of film making. He’s managed to carve himself out a huge niche with those two aforementioned outstanding efforts, but with his third feature he takes things in a slightly different direction. Arguably his most mainstream movie to date, War On Everyone could also be his best; a clear pastiche on seventies cop shows like Starsky and Hutch – we even have a drifting muscle car, 70s twangy bass music and permed informant in Malcolm Barrett’s hilarious Reggie – eighties and nineties movies like Lethal Weapon and – we’ll say it – Bad Boys, though that doesn’t do this justice. All of this combined with that very dark streak of humour and a touch of one of Pena’s previous efforts, End Of Watch. If the Beastie Boys made a full-length Sabotage movie, this is probably what it would look like. Seriously, its the best thing to happen to Albequerque since Walter White and Jesse Pinkman (in terms of Breaking Bad putting the city on the map – we’re not promoting crack or anything).

As we said, Pena is fantastic, easily his best ever performance, and his chemistry with Skarsgard is electric. They bounce so well of of one another; one of the greatest on-screen comedy teamings since Riggs and Murtagh – though again, that statement doesn’t do this justice. We have a great villain in Theo James, gloriously darting away from his persona as a teen idol, chewing the scenery nd spitting it out, but not too much. The new James Franco? We mean that with the greatest respect to both. (Theo) James is brilliant; his villainous British lord a break from the norm, and a vile human with impeccable dress sense. His sidekick in Caleb Jones‘s Birdwell also adds a news spin to campy henchmen, and Keith Jardine drops a blinder as the tracksuit-adorned Barry. Then there’s Tessa Thompson as the woman that tamed the beast that is Monroe, a welcomed addition to the cast, riding the wave of success following Creed.

The biggest asset to the film however, is McDonaugh’s excellent, supremely witty screenplay and his direction – he even directs this like a Michael Bay movie – just with more snake-laden strippers, obese electric wheelchair drivers and camp sidekicks.

War On Everyone is a very entertaining, laugh-out-loud funny flick – one you know you’re going to love from the opening few frames. Such a delight.

War On Everyone is currently playing at the Sydney Film Festival.

War On Everyone opens in UK cinemas on 30th September 2016.