Salvador (1986)

Directed by Oliver Stone. Starring James Woods.

James Woods, from back when he was
a whole lot younger and slightly less creepy

There's nothing too profound to say about this film, that, oh, Stephen Kinzer hasn't said much more eloquently than I could ever manage. The main character gets a nice speech debating some army brass about the Kissinger doctrine. There's a lot of gratuitous violence. Some gratuitous sex. In one scene, the gratuitous sex is really gratuitous violence. I had a lot of fun with this movie watching it without subtitles; some scenes are entirely in Spanish. I'd love to know what was going on with that Bishop, for example. And why were those preppy freaks pressuring Kelly to release US aid to the Contras? Totally missed the significance of that in the larger scheme of things (except, that, you know, it was Bad, because then all these tanks and helicopters came out and for some reason started gunning down the journalists. I mean, even the guerillas aren't that stupid!).

There's a weird section in the middle when Woods bitches at some official from the US Army for their shitty foreign policy.  It's like getting a history lesson, all in five minutes or so of dialogue.  Pretty cool.

Woods was apparently also a real pain to work with; he and Oliver Stone were at each others throats the entirety of filming.  Because he thought the film's ending was too depressing, Woods schemed to film a different one -- changing his lines last minute on the last shot, on the last reel of film.  For those of you who don't have the attention span of a seven year old, you can watch all about it in this documentary (youtube link).  There's also an interview with the American diplomat, Kelly, who it turns out is a pretty cool guy.

Both Oliver Stone and and James Woods' best movie, ever.  Unusual, original -- a must see.