Charlie Wilson's War

Synopsis

Oscar® winners Tom Hanks, Julia Roberts and Philip Seymour Hoffman, team up with Academy Award® winning director Mike Nichols and screenwriter Aaron Sorkin (The West Wing), to tell the incredible but true story of how a playboy congressman, a renegade CIA man and a beautiful Houston socialite joined forces to lead the largest and most successful covert operation in history.

Charlie Wilson (Hanks) was a bachelor congressman from Texas who had a habit of showing up in hot tubs with strippers and cocaine. His 'good time Charlie' exterior, however, masked an extraordinary mind, a deep sense of patriotism and a passion for the underdog. Charlie's long term friend and occasional lover was Joanne Herring (Roberts), one of the wealthiest women in Texas, and a virulent anti-communist. When the Soviet army invaded Afghanistan in the 1980s, Herring considered the US response to be insipid, and prodded Charlie into supporting the Mujahideen freedom fighters. Partnering with unorthadox CIA agent Gust Avrakotos (Seymour Hoffman), the three traveled the world making the most unlikely alliances. Their success was so remarkable that following the Red Army's retreat, when asked how a peasant army could deliver such a blow to a superpower, Pakistani President Mohammed Zia ul-Haq responded simply, 'Charlie did it'.