LIONS FOR LAMBS made a gallant, thoughtful and sincere 2007 counterattack on the run-of-the-complex rah-rah agitprop fodder that’s bombed us with payloads of steer manure since St. Reagan & Co. hijacked the national narrative four decades back. Noble intent fell, missed in action by public apathy about wars playing out on TV (“like, another movie where, like, you need, like, a map, or whatever”) and sniped by the clannish circular firing squad of critic-think that’s mosquito’d around since the mid-60s. The former lies in a systematically dumbed-down populace, spoon-fed lies, addicted to a diet of pap. The latter’s barfed from ostensibly politically aware reviewers who wheeze about a lack of mainstream films that challenge mainline dogma, yet when one shows up they group-whizz on it like it’s a poison pill from the Pentagon.

“Rome is burning. And the problem is not just with the people who started it. They’re past irredeemable. The problem’s with all of us who do nothing.”

Directed by Robert Redford, the screenplay by Matthew Michael Carnahan (World War Z, Deepwater Horizon) melds three separate but causality-linked plotlines that lead from California college classrooms and D.C. Senate offices to snowy Central Asian ridges and the solemn landscapes of Arlington National Cemetery. While a ‘Nam vet poli-sci professor (Redford) tries to reach a gifted student (Andrew Garfield) on the verge of saying f-it to caring, two of the teachers earlier pupils (Michael Peña and Derek Luke), who chose to “make a difference” and serve in the Army, are trapped on a hilltop in Afghanistan. They’re the ‘point of the spear’ for a “game changer” operation pushed by a rising star Republican politician (Tom Cruise), being interviewed by a skeptical left-of-center journalist (Meryl Streep). Time-lines, conscience calls and career moves collide with the perceptions and realities of a rueful past, confused present and dicey future.

The Afghan segment situationally concerns intimately-scaled, harrowing combat, its life & death drama bracketed by the conversation confrontations between the concerned educator and his recalcitrant undergrad mirrored by the jousting of the wary reporter and brashly confident lawmaker. Granted the star actors are acknowledged as coming from the left end of the spectrum, the script isn’t a one-sided polemic—the soldiers naive but honest idealism isn’t mocked and Cruise’s keen-edged hawk is allowed a dimension of logic (albeit flawed) rather than conveniently simple bluster: leave that to actual non-reel war cheerleaders we’ve come to know and despise. Redford, 70, is both relaxed and engaged sparring with Garfield, 23, brightly brash, while Streep and Cruise deploy minute but telling shades to their on-guard characters that fit neatly into their screen personas.

Reviews for this meditation on the Afghan War, the Terror War writ large and American Apathy in general were for the most part disparaging: the sniff & snort zone that formed back when it was deemed dutiful to slay Stanley Kramer had now metastasized (after lacerating Oliver Stone) to ravage Robert Redford. Brush thru the 73% negative dints on ‘Rotten Tomatoes’, for example, and digest a blizzard of jaded, lazy, often downright stupid comments. Speaking of sheep, in the hinterland (oh, sieg! sorry, The Homeland) Johnny Vape & Keri Calftat inflicted collateral damage at the box office by cine-escaping elsewhere: the global gross of $64,812,000 wasn’t nearly enough to cover the $35,000,000 cost (times 1.5 with prints & advertising), thanks to the US end of that being less than a quarter, $15,002,100 and 123rd place in a year where greater numbers attended the apparently more relatable issues of Hostel:Part II and Saw IV . *

With Peter Berg and Kevin Dunn. 92 minutes.

* Ninety percent of the movies that have dealt in some fashion with the blunderbuss American excursions into the world’s testiest back yard ask audiences to accept: this is one of a handful that asks them to consider, in a brief, digestible story framework that also fits as entertainment. Since—pishung!—it doesn’t miraculously solve everything in an hour and a half, the effort was keelhauled by critics, who magically not only know how movies work (a neat trick since they’ve never made one) but also possess the snap answers to every imaginable problem or scenario that issues and stories can present. Ignore ’em, the vast majority don’t know any more than you do: make your own judgement calls.

Redford: “I am passionate. I am political about my country, about what it is, how strong it is, how strong it remains. Lions for Lambs got rough treatment, and I think it was because–and I don’t want to sound defensive–but I think it was misperceived. I am not a left-wing person. I’m just a person interested in the sustainability of my country.”

Robert Redford’s given us a lot, in a number of ways, for many years. His movie deserved better. Whether we do, collectively, is up for grabs. Mull that 14 years after this film came out, we were still mired in Afghanistan. As another Americana icon warned us, “Fasten your seat belts, it’s going to be a bumpy night.”  Just swap night with forever.