From their portacabin of death, all-American jocks get to blow shit up with only RSI to fear; the lady cries yet complies; Ethan Hawke has a moral crisis whilst remaining utterly immoral; Betty Draper makes an appearance.

It’s unclear if Good Kill is boring intentionally or by accident; it would be an unusual artistic choice for a director to emulate drone warfare’s detachment and repetition consciously, yet that’s exactly the effect Niccol created.

Despite setting up the absurdity of remote-control combat, a CIA-led Milgram experiment is unoriginal and the dialogue, filled with star-spangled slogans, is dreadful.

With more stereotypes than you can shake a joystick at, Good Kill reduces an important debate to a cliché-ridden mess. You’ll die of boredom before it hits its target.

RATING: 2/5

INFORMATION

CAST: Ethan Hawke, January Jones, Zoë Kravitz, Bruce Greenwood

DIRECTOR: Andrew Niccol

WRITER: Andrew Niccol

SYNOPSIS: A fighter pilot turned drone pilot fights the Taliban by remote control for 12 hours a day, then goes home to the suburbs and feuds with his wife for the other 12.