Adapted from a factual book by the war correspondent Kim Barker, Whiskey Tango Foxtrot is not the first film to deal with the addictive qualities of combat. The Hurt Locker cast a cool eye over the adrenaline hit that hooks bomb-disposal experts; more recently the documentaries Which Way Is the Front Line from Here? The Life and Time of Tim Hetherington and Only the Dead explored the thrill that sends reporters after stories that could claim their lives. But this is one of the first to look at the lure of the frontline from a female perspective.
Tina Fey is well cast as Barker, an inexperienced reporter who finds herself flung into the “Kabubble”: the hard-living, hothouse community of war correspondents stationed in Afghanistan during the ongoing war. Spiked with gallows humour, it has tonal similarities to MASH, and as such it is an entertaining watch. However, the film has a deeply conventional, conservative heart – as evidenced by a piece of closure involving a legless veteran that would be toe-curling but for the absence of toes to curl – and it lacks the formal daring of Robert Altman’s seminal war movie.
