In Whiskey Tango Foxtrot,
comedy darling Tina Fey plays a harried war reporter sent to Afghanistan in
2003, where her coverage of the war becomes increasingly ignored, much like the
war itself, in the wake of other more exciting stories (as in Iraq). Whiskey Tango Foxtrot represents a
departure for Fey, whose previous vehicles were merely cashing in on her
success with 30 Rock, a show that,
while never commanding big ratings, garnered an avid cult following and oodles
of critical praise and awards.
My feelings about this movie vacillated almost from the beginning. The
movie opens in 2006 during a rager of a party, where Fey’s character, Kim
Baker, curses like an Afghani sailor (if such a thing existed in this
landlocked desert country). The subtitles reveal the depth of her knowledge
after having spent three years in this country, which has somehow, strangely,
become a home to her. But Kim is an utterly ambivalent character, which is one
of the movie’s biggest problems.
Kim’s ambivalence makes sense. Whiskey
Tango Foxtrot effectively and correctly explores the war in Afghanistan as
a complicated, often confusing project, and a mission that becomes increasingly
more complicated by our involvement
in Iraq. Kim jumps at the chance when she’s initially offered the job because
she’s desperate for a change. As Kim puts it, she’s afraid she’ll become “an
ottoman” in her office. What’s more, she’s involved in a comfortable
relationship that’s become a little too comfortable. She and her significant
other exchange brief words at the airport (he’s just returning from a business trip,
and she’s departing for what she thinks will be three months in the Middle
East). Her boyfriend suggests a quickie in the mens’ room, which Kim rejects,
and that’s almost the last we see of him. (He turns up in a few abortive Skype
conversations, marred by the bad internet connection.)
Kim’s arrival in Afghanistan only further expands her feelings of
ambivalence. Afghanistan, we’re told, is a country that literally has shit in
the air, but for Kim, it represents purpose and career advancement and the
chance to cover something real and important. She befriends a British reporter
named Tanya Vanderpoel (Margot Robbie), who requests that Kim hand over her
stacked bodyguard Nic, for sex. Kim is shocked that anyone would ask her permission, and still more shocked when
Robbie’s character appraises Kim’s sexual capital: “You’re probably a 7 in New
York, but you’re a 10 in Afghanistan.” Kim’s baffled reply: “What are you,
then, a 14?” (Robbie is, after all, the girl who explained boring housing
market terms to us in a bubble bath in The
Big Short.)
Whiskey
Tango Foxtrot is a fascinating movie, but it doesn’t always work. The directors,
Glenn Ficarra and John Requa, have a habit of introducing interesting scenes,
scenes which might explore characters in great depth, and then short-handing
them. We’re never sure if this is supposed to be a buddy movie about Kim’s and
Tanya’s friendship as two reporters who find that misery truly does love
company. The directors provide big moments in their friendship (a near-death
experience, an act of journalistic betrayal), but these events are the sum
total of their relationship: There’s no connective tissue to imbue these big
moments with dramatic weight.
Part of the problem is that directors never know what to do with Tina
Fey in movies. They seem to be stuck because of her character on 30 Rock. That show gave Fey just the
right kind of character: the vaguely desperate, almost has-been, funny-smart
nerd Liz Lemon. But Fey’s transition into movies has not been as successful. Whiskey does avoid the usual temptations
of making Fey a desperate single woman looking for love (as in 2013’s Admission), and her romance with an Irish photographer named Iain
(played by Martin Freeman), has moments of charm. (Iain first appears sleazy
and singularly interested in sex, but he develops into a more interesting
character.) But Whiskey Tango Foxtrot
is a sort of a drama that’s confused by its star, a comic actress. The whole
movie feels muddled and strained, and at times I couldn’t wait for
it to end.
What’s more, the directors have fitted an existential and
unapologetically wistful movie into a cookie cutter format. It explores questions of great nuance, but then reverts to its genre conventions, like the flawed romance between Fey and Freeman which must be redeemed. (But, to give the movie some credit, it never stops dealing with ambiguities. When Kim visits a soldier who lost both legs, she's overwhelmed with the feeling that her reporting brought about his injuries; he's able to see it differently though: it happened. It's past. Accept it and move on.)
The movie gets Afghanistan right in the sense that it never quite figures the place out. It echoes are real problems interacting with Middle Eastern countries: We don’t get their culture. Kim makes a number of rookie gaffes, like forgetting her head-dress or entering a gathering of angry men in the street, with camera in hand. But even she’s making foolish mistakes, she’s also making bold choices. Perhaps the most poignantly funny scene is when Kim informs a marine general (played by Billy Bob Thornton) that the well they keep digging for a small village, one that keeps getting mysteriously sabotaged, is actually inhibiting the social life of the village women, whose only time to interact with each other occurs during their walks to the river for water. Kim becomes their ally in that moment, and in turn she becomes what she’s wanted to be for the whole movie: necessary.
The movie gets Afghanistan right in the sense that it never quite figures the place out. It echoes are real problems interacting with Middle Eastern countries: We don’t get their culture. Kim makes a number of rookie gaffes, like forgetting her head-dress or entering a gathering of angry men in the street, with camera in hand. But even she’s making foolish mistakes, she’s also making bold choices. Perhaps the most poignantly funny scene is when Kim informs a marine general (played by Billy Bob Thornton) that the well they keep digging for a small village, one that keeps getting mysteriously sabotaged, is actually inhibiting the social life of the village women, whose only time to interact with each other occurs during their walks to the river for water. Kim becomes their ally in that moment, and in turn she becomes what she’s wanted to be for the whole movie: necessary.
This movie never figures out what it is. It’s a curious failure,
and as such, a mirror of our Middle Eastern entanglements. But sometimes failures are more fascinating than successes, and in its own way, Whiskey Tango Foxtrot achieves moments of comedic brilliance and insight that make it impossible to dismiss.
With Christopher Abbott, Alfred Molina, Sheila Vand, and Steve
Peacocke. Written by Robert Carlock; based on Kim Barker’s memoir The Taliban Shuffle.
