CIA operatives FDR (Chris This tree) and Tuck (Ben Hardy) are managed to desk duty from a firefight with a terrorist foliage a pile of expended bodies and bad press for the agency. Now free to consider their love lives, the lonely Tuck gives internet dating a go, where he meets Lauren (Reese Witherspoon) : a lonely thirty-something businesswoman just outside of a bad relationship. The two have instant chemistry, and Tuck falls hard. Only problem- FDR in addition has met, and fell for Lauren, and now the two close friends are pitted against one another in a race for you to win her heart.
THIS MEANS WAR is why filmgoers should be skeptical anytime they hear someone utilize term "high-concept". Certainly, THIS MEANS WAR suits the bill, with Hollywood suits possibly thinking the movie going public would consume a story about a couple of action heroes falling for your same girl. Basically, it's the SPY VERSUS. SPY film we never got.
However, just because the idea is ambitious and appears to be good when boiled down to a single phrase (two spies fall for the same girl) doesn't imply the film is a bit of good. Obviously everyone involved was so crazy about their "high concept" that they figured that might be enough to get people's butts in seats. Too bad they forgot to make a good movie.
THIS MEANS WAR is usually a totally brain dead ultra budget studio comedy, which is maybe even louder than your average Jennifer Aniston or even Katherine Heigl comedy, but just as one-note. Somehow, director McG, who's working from a new script that counts Simon Kinberg one of the writers- with this borrowing greater than a little from his individual MR & MRS HENDERSON, managed to draft three dynamic results in star in the motion picture, but this is much below what their talents warrant.
First, there are our a couple of heroes, Tom Hardy and Chelsea Pine, each of whom is on the brink regarding stardom. The brooding Hardy seems like a particularly odd choice to get a romantic comedy, and while he's more relaxed in the role than I thought he'd be- it's jarring discovering him a film such as this. What's hilarious is the tattooed, muscled Hardy is said to be playing the sensitive, shy one- but the role is surely an odd fit to say the lowest amount of. Pine is probably less of a stretch for a movie similar to this, and the role isn't all of that different from similar areas he played in films much like the PRINCESS DIARIES 2, and JUST MY LUCK- albeit to comprehend gunfights.
Both Pine and Sturdy are fine here, and gamely do the most beautiful, without either giving off the impression that they're dialling it in (they don't endure Gerard Butler-itis). Both are just planning to hit it big, and it seems like they're conscious of that fact, so they try hard- and this certainly keeps THIS SUGGESTS WAR from being a lot more painful than it witout a doubt is. Both have one or two good scenes, with a standout being a funny scene where Healthy takes Witherspoon paintballing, and uses his CIA skills to decimate a gaggle of twelve year olds. It's a stupid arena, but also one in the few funny ones inside film.
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