Todd Phillips directs Miles Teller, Jonah Hill and Bradley Cooper in this “based on a true story” of screw ups who become arms dealers for the Pentagon. 

Like an equally bloodless The Big Short, this wants to replicate the absurdity and rush of some white collar crime craziness (tutting at the end at the behaviour it was lauding only ten minutes earlier) but never quite comes anywhere near the dizzying gold standard of its shared template: Goodfellas. In fact the only film that ever has managed to speak convincingly in that modern classic’s bold language is Scorsese’s own The Wolf of Wall Street. Jonah Hill shone in that and here he is the best thing in War Dogs too. From his girlish giggles to his glee at firing off machine guns via his long perfected schmuck grin when making serious bucks, he proves captivating. The gory cavity where any heart of the tale should be. When he is off screen things dull right down and numbers are thrown at us. A million dollar deal here and there; Miles Teller reminds us, for the seventh time, a few months earlier his stooge was massaging guys for a mere $75 dollars an hour. We live in a universe where the protagonists and writers and director and producers all think $75 dollars an hour is breadline poverty. Also one where nobody really gets their comeuppance. Teller has to go back to earning seven times minimum wage and spending time with his family – oh the humanity! At least he was the nicer of the two death merchants. We leave Jonah Hill’s obstential villian in his plush office possibly facing four years in prison – we never see him giving up his ill-gotten lifestyle nor do we suffer the pain of the deaths that happen in his wake. Only a epilogue scene, where Teller has an impressively guarded conversation with bigger fish Cooper in the aftermath, carries any of the threat or tension or genuine moral turpitude the rest of the running time severely lacks. Still, Hill continually celebrating any arms deal to some choice soundtrack proves diverting, if you go into this looking for cynical entertainment. Leave your ethics at home.

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