The War Effort (2003) User Reviews

good rookie effort

[RegRam · 7/10 · 21 January 2003]

I saw this film at the Nodance Film Festival over the weekend. Overall, it was very funny and a good concept. I would compare it to the mocumentary style of Dog Show and Waiting for Guffman.

My negatives were that the acting was uneven and the movie needed to be shortened by 10-20 minutes. There were a couple of times where my feeling was "okay, we get the joke already."

But I thought the movie was good overall, and Robbie and Roy were hilarious!

Pretty Funny and Great Concept

[syntapmarketing · 10/10 · 12 May 2003]

This movie was a highly creative work... the nutcases portrayed in the piece were well done. A personal highlight for me were the poor pets of these people, who were dressed in some scenes based on the fanatical behaviors of their owners. Robbie and Roy (a patriotic gay couple) were a riot. The music was original and fit the tone of the movie well.

Hilarious and Bold!

[MovieManUtah · 13 February 2003]

I saw this movie at the Sundance Film Festival last month and I can't remember laughing this much at a movie in a long time. Mainly because the cast and crew spoke the truth about all the flag-o-philes and patriots who came out of the woodworks after 9/11. The movie was clearly made on a low budget, but that didn't limit the comedy at all. There were so many layers to the satire, I'd be hard pressed to list them here. But I imagine that this film will be the M*A*S*H of the war on terrorism. Bravo to all involved and if you can catch this at another festival, I urge you to do so.

Brings shame to the world of "Mockumentary"

[gsmith83-1 · 1/10 · 21 January 2003]

I had the displeasure of seeing this movie at the Sundance Film Festival, and my sole purpose of writing this comment is to prevent any sane person from seeing it as well.

When I heard of the premise about a mockumentary about the new-found patriotism everybody seemed to have after 9-11, I was definitely looking forward to The War Effort. After almost two hours of poorly done homosexual-dildo jokes (as if they could be done in good taste), horrible improvised "acting" performances, and overall immature storyline, I am questioning how this movie could even have been produced in the first place.

Perhaps I am being too harsh. If you would like to see a movie that looks to be made by a team of middle-school kids, by all means, enjoy the show!

Low budget laughs

[OldPolitico · 13 April 2004]

I bought this on the internet based on a very sparse description and I was pleasantly surprised. I've seen it at least three times and it's still funny (and I happen to be a very conservative Republican, not the target audience), which is more than I can say for a lot of big budget studio flicks that claim to be comedies. I was also surprised to see someone on the screen I actually knew - Deane Weislogel and I were elected as constables in Berks County in the same year and often trained and worked together. The mockumentary style helps to cover some of the defects of a small budget. My only serious problem with the movie was the "Bob Hope" story line; the acting was fine, but the character's comic material should have been less awful to be more convincing and less screen time should have been devoted to this character.

Hilarious debut effort

[slinkyboa-1 · 12 January 2004]

In contrast to the other viewer's comments, I was ecstatic after viewing "The War Effort" and felt quite lucky to see it. Similar to the uncanny characters of Christopher Guest's movies ("Best in Show", "Waiting for Guffman", "Mighty Wind") and political sprite of Michael Moore, "The War Effort" captures a group of eccentric middle-America patriotic citizens. The entire movie was improvised superbly. The ending has some unfortunate over the top moments, and some scenes may drag on a little too long, but overall the realness of these characters and their follies is funny and non-stop entertaining.