KYLE SMITH reviews Charlie Wilson’s War:

I somewhat enjoyed “Charlie Wilson’s War,” but I’m glad I don’t have any money invested in it. It would be exaggerating only slightly to call it The Congressional Record meets “Ishtar.”

How strange is this film? So strange that there aren’t really any stakes for the main character. So strange that pages and pages of dialogue float by trying to convince you to care whether the 1981 covert ops budget for aid to Afghanistan’s mujahideen fighting the invading Soviets was $10 million or $40 million, or how many T-55 tanks the Soviet invaders used. So strange that Democrats are shown killing Commies. Not calling for sanctions against them; not filing paperwork against them in the U.N.; not calling for investigations of how their prisoners of war were treated: just getting them in the crosshairs, and pow.

Well, I might pay to see that — if I didn’t also have to watch Tom Cruise.

UPDATE: And I don’t have to! Somehow, probably having something to do with being on my first cup of coffee, I read “Tom Hanks” as “Tom Cruise.” Now, Tom Hanks I might pay to see.

Cruise I might pay to avoid. Which opens up a new profit avenue for Hollywood, if they’re smart enough to exploit it, I guess . . . .

ANOTHER UPDATE: Brian Gates emails: “A movie about American efforts to fight totalitarianism that focuses on one Democrat in Congress? I think I’ll wait 20 years and watch the sequel, ‘Joe Lieberman’s War’.”