Wild Horse Nine

Two CIA agents (Sam Rockwell, John Malkovich) stationed in Chile in the 1970s, are sent to Easter Island for a mission.

If anyone has perfected the “two blokes with an age difference exchange jibes at each other and have existential crises” genre it’s Martin McDonagh. This isn’t the finest example of his work but I very much enjoyed it nonetheless.

The trailer might have you thinking it’s a sort of screwball spy comedy, but really this is quite a ponderous film happy to take its time getting to its destination. Malkovich’s character is an operative who was involved in all the American attempts to destabilize democracies, and this film is set during the CIA-backed coup on Chile. Through this it provides a slightly glib potted history of American interference in foreign governments, and while sometimes it can be tiresome at other times it is the film’s primary source of comedy.

Perhaps the slightly tired and cynical tone of the film made me a bit tired and cynical along with it, but for the most part this is a success and it’s fun to see McDonagh apply his formula to a new setting with new actors.