In 1979 a secret unit was established by the most gifted minds within the US Army. Defying all known accepted military practice – and indeed, the laws of physics – they believed that a soldier could adopt the cloak of invisibility, pass cleanly through walls and, perhaps most chillingly, kill goats just by staring at them. Entrusted with defending America from all known adversaries, they were the First Earth Battalion. And they really weren’t joking. What’s more, they’re back and fighting the War on Terror. ‘The men who stare at goats’ reveals extraordinary – and very nutty – national secrets at the core of George W Bush’s War on Terror.
With first-hand access to the leading players in the story, Ronson traces the evolution of these bizarre activities over the past three decades, and sees how it is alive today within US Homeland Security and post-war Iraq. Why are they blasting Iraqi prisoners-of-war with the theme tune to Barney the Purple Dinosaur? Why have 100 de-bleated goats been secretly placed inside the Special Forces command centre at Fort Bragg, North Carolina? How was the US Military associated with the mysterious mass-suicide of a strange cult from San Diego? ‘The men who stare at goats’ answers these, and many more, questions.
Because of the typical Hollywood treatment this film has been denounced by the books author, but I have to say it looks pretty darn funny.
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By Allah’s will, all things are possible.
LMAO – Gotta see this one… it will be like dvorak.org/blog, but on the white screen…
see = watch… my psychic skills aren’t good enough to change it… 🙁
Oh brother … not funny. It’s just not funny or the least bit interesting 🙁
It’s freaking hilarious.
I usally wait until movies are at BlockBuster before I watch them, but; this will be an exception.
Any movie with Kevin Spacy, Jeff Bridges, and George Clooney has the potential to be great.
So what if it doesn’t follow the book. Is this supposed to be a comedy or an expose?
I read the book by Jon Ronson and I was amazed. It looks like the movie spices it up a bit, but read the book to see how whacked out this unit was.
In the future I watch this movie…
…and I really think it’s stupid.
Many goats were harmed during the production of this film.
What’s important is
not what’s real
not what you believe yourself
not what the enemy believes
but it is what the enemy is prepared to spend money on just in case you are on to something.
‘All wars are economic’ Karl Marx
I wonder how many hours of filming were lost because George Looney and Kevin Spacey where doing each other in the Star Waggons?
Reminds me of the movie “The Pentagon Wars”.
Also, considering the real project Stargate, this does not really surprise me.
The Russians were doing the same thing. If I recall I saw a special on this several years back during or near the end of the cold war. They actually seemed to have gotten some results a few times but with no way to clearly verify what might have been worth checking out from the BS…
I still think this could be as funny as the The Mummy and about as based on fact.
How different is this than Rayguns Starwars which is still being funded today?
Who here thinks a shield against MIRV’ed ICBM’s is more rational than researching walking thru walls? or what may have more validity today==invisibility or personal armor plating?
Science is about testing. Concluding is about something other than science.
I’m no psychic but even I can tell this stinker is a box-office flop.
It’ll do very well in the torrentsphere, though 🙂
I’ve read the book – and it is pretty interesting. He also has a TV show which covered some of this too.
Although the book is interesting – my favorite Jon Ronson book is – Them: Adventures with Extremists. It’s a similar territory, but reads more easily, and is more amusing.
Jesus Christ, this is an absolute travesty. “I went looking for a story but my friend Lynn brought me an adventure.” Complete and total bullshit, folks.
What makes The Men Who Stare At Goats (as well as Them) such interesting reads is that underneath the shocking, farcical tone is a story of a flawed ideology that results in many tragedies in how it eventually becomes applied. This is why Ronson is such a great writer, he’s able to frame the absurd in comedic anecdotes to wrap your head around it so that when the full impact of what is happening is revealed it’s all the more terrifying for having been funny. This appears to not only reject the latter, but seems to actually embrace the kind of silliness that Ronson had set out to expose.
Fucking Hollywood.
Is it too late to join?
With that cast I thought it might have been a Cohen Brothers film. Pity it ain’t. They seem to be the only American directors that can do comedy (except maybe Woody Allen).
“How to Kill a Goat with you Mind”
That video is just creepy. Scary that people like that exist.
#21 – Ah_Yea
My neighbor is a fundamentalist Pentecostal… he believes in some real weird shit, like faith healing and demons. I have a hard time not laughing when he gets going on religion.
What about the men who stare at Goatsie?
#23 – Usagi – What about the men who stare at Goatsie?
No-one’s interested in watching a movie about Alfredone and Hoover.
Needs more Scully.
The Russians also had a Psychic research unit. Possibly why the CIA wasted tax dollars doing the same. But I saw this Tv show, where the Amazing Randy, went to Russia to talk to these “scientists” and other so-called psychics. And Randy pretty much showed them all to be fakers.
And yet, Randy couldn’t (or wasn’t allowed to) refute psychics in America. The land of the protected crackpots and hoodwinkers. And while I was hoping that Americans would outgrow this paranormal belief crap, by the 21 century. Instead we now have three Tv series devoted to it. There were never that many, devoted to mainstream religion. Or even the vaguest appearance of a religion, like Dr. Quinn Medicine Woman.
Not to mention nearly a movie a month, coming out of Hollywood, is about the paranormal. They’re not just for Halloween anymore. Have the demon-worshiping atheists simply taken over Hollywood and the US Military?
Apparently, keeping this stuff such a big secret for so long. Was just to protect the US Army from major embarrassment and shame. Rather than from giving away ideas to the Reds. Now, it must be thought to be tolerable, at least. Maybe even acceptable. So this author was leaked the facts.
This movie is loosely base on Major General Albert “Bert” N. Stubblebine III. Before you denounce this group of um… special guys.. Keep in mind that they probably had more fun at their job than most of the ‘sour patch’ commenters oh here. Plus Stubbleline and his wife are pretty nice folks all things considered.
I just tried staring down my cat to make her do something interesting… she just fell over and made a tribble noise. Most interesting. =p
#6
What about Ewan McGreggor?
Try the cloudbursting on chemtrails!
It works!!
The CIA did have a “Remote Viewing” unit which tested self-professed psychics to see if they would spy on the Russians from thousands of miles away. Not sure how well that went though.