This Means War

Starring Chris Pine, Tom Hardy and Reese Witherspoon, This Means War was billed as a romantic comedy spy movie when it was released in 2012.

The movie opened on a swanky party on the top floor of a sky scraper in Hong Kong with a helipad.  Pine and Hardy’s characters were CIA agents on a mission to capture a criminal and “secure the device”.  Although the mission was meant to be covert, the CIA agents engaged in a shootout with the criminal’s bodyguards and pushed his brother off the helipad, sending the brother crashing on a car below the building and earning the hatred of the criminal.

Back in USA, where the agents were assigned desk jobs for their protection, Hardy’s character signed up for online dating and was paired with Witherspoon’s character.  By some coincidence, Witherspoon’s character ended up undecided between the two agents and started dating both of them simultaneously.  Having realized that, the two agents, initially under the cover of tracking the criminal, used CIA resources to spy on Witherspoon’s character and each other in a bid to outdo each other to win Witherspoon’s affections.

At the end of the movie, Witherspoon’s character chose Pine’s character, who asked Hardy’s character to be the best man at his wedding, the agents having made up and Hardy’s character having remarried his ex-wife.

 

For a romantic comedy spy movie, This Means War tried to be many genres at the same time but unfortunately was not.  Pine and Hardy’s characters displayed great chemistry-on-screen as best-of-friends CIA agents, but the chemistry seemed lacking when either of them paired with Witherspoon’s character.  It appeared that their motivation smacked more strongly of one-upmanship over each other rather than genuine affection for Witherspoon’s character. 

A spy movie this certainly was not either.  The CIA agents’ skills were used to hilarious effect when both were planting surveillance equipment in Witherspoon’s house and when CIA resources were used to Pine and Hardy’s characters’ personal motivation.  So much for the suspension of realism.  Or perhaps such things do happen?

I haven’t watched any of the movies Pine starred in, so I’m not familiar with the actor’s work.  But why did he look so much as Ben Stiller in this movie, especially with the thick bushy eyebrows?  And Hardy, to me, resembled Daniel Craig.  Pine, Hardy and Witherspoon are recognizable names to me, but I felt that Witherspoon’s character could have been portrayed by other actresses as well.  Cameroon Diaz sprung to mind.  But perhaps not.  If I thought Witherspoon was unmemorable in this forgettable movie, it might be the problem with the weak script, and Diaz might not have been able to save it.   This Means War is great for accompanying lunch/dinner, such that, either it provides a distraction if the food is awful, or the food provides enough distraction from the movie.