Atropia

As a way to get soldiers ready for combat, the American military operates several training centers that have full-scale foreign villages where troops can practice maneuvers while surrounded by actors role-playing as local citizens and opposition forces. Hailey Gates' war satire "Atropia" mines a lot of humor from what must be a fairly absurd situation for those on-site actors: What life circumstances took place to have actors end up in a place like this? What if you don't speak the language of the country being recreated? Are some roles better than others? Do better actors get to be the main terrorist? Can you ruin a military training exercise by overacting? It's an interesting and unique setting that seems tailor-made for comedy, and Gates (who expands her previous 2019 short film on the same topic) clearly has a good handle on it.

Set during the Iraq war, the movie follows Fayruz (Alia Shawkat), a young actress who took the gig to hopefully get noticed and move into movies or television. She works in Atropia, a city constructed in the Californian desert for war games, and understands Arabic (but can't speak it), which gives her an advantage when it comes to getting the juiciest parts. Still, she competes with her co-workers to be noticed, which can be hard to do when you get cast as "street DVD seller" rather than "chemist who makes bombs." There are several excellent running gags throughout, including onlookers openly appreciating when someone cries believably or delivers a particularly dramatic line of dialogue. Special effect bombs fail to go off, extras in Middle Eastern attire trade for cigarettes and hang out in flip-flops between takes, and posted signs remind actors how to correctly make their own convincing fake blood. Fake reporters for Box News follow soldiers around to get them used to dealing with the media. It's a shenanigan-heavy atmosphere, where even the people in charge act more like Hollywood casting directors than military personnel.

And this casually unserious tone is the point, as the movie attempts to poke fun at the disconnect between how we view modern warfare at home in America and the horrific reality of the real wars actually being fought far away. Certain lines of serious dialogue will suddenly appear, asking questions like "do these soldiers even know why they are going over there?" or having a solider's wife lament that "all my husband could think about when he got home was going back". However, moments like these are often quickly glossed over in order to quickly get to another gag, almost as if the movie is afraid of the audience getting upset or even bored by anything too real.

In fact, the movie chooses possibly the least interesting way to move forward in its second half, introducing a love story between Fayruz and Abu Dice (Callum Turner), an experienced veteran who provides the camp with first-hand knowledge of war, and is desperate to get back to Iraq. This ho-hum romance really adds nothing to the story, as we never really believe either character's heart is really in it, as they are both destined to end up on opposite sides of the globe. As such, the movie kind of sputters to an end, as if Gates didn't really have a narrative direction outside of sporadic satirical moments.

But a lot of that satire is pretty effective and often very funny. An A-list actor whose name I won't spoil makes an incredible cameo when he drops by the camp hoping to get a taste of "real combat" in preparation for a role in an upcoming war movie. It's just one of several clever scenes that point out how war is nothing but a game to many Americans, a cool-looking theater with bad-ass vehicles, clothing and weapons, and an opportunity to pretend to support our troops while doing nothing at all.

Shawkat is a revelation in the starring role, carrying the movie with her effortless swagger and biting snark, while still selling her moments of vulnerability. It's a shame the script didn't have more bite to it, resulting in nothing more than a moderately clever but broadly ineffective project that feels like a bit of a missed opportunity.