I Watched ‘Allied’ So You Wouldn’t Have To

By Ryan O'Connell on 03/13/2017 • ( 0 )

Note: This post contains spoilers.

Note About the Note: That’s the point.

Note About the Previous Two Notes: You’re welcome.

So first, some context. On Friday My Darling Wife and I went out on a date night. It was lovely. Cold, but lovely. Now I’m not going to say we stayed out too late, but I will say that we stayed out late enough. And we have a little lady at home who is almost two and gets up early regardless of what we were doing the night before. Long story short, Saturday was tough business and when came to plans for Saturday night, mindless entertainment was our chosen speed. If there were ever a time to watch Allied, a movie that everyone in our household had heard wasn’t very good but gosh darn we would make the decision ourselves, Saturday was it.

Think about it, how could Allied be that bad or as Peter Travers called it, “a handsome empty shell of a movie?” Brad Pitt is in it and that’s cool and Marion Cotillard is in it too, also cool. It’s about spies, it’s about World War II, it’s about domestic deception. Robert Zemeckis directed it and that dude directed Forrest Gump for crying out loud. On paper, Allied looks like as much of a sure thing as a sure thing can look.

A sure thing (pause for dramatic effect) it is not. You should not watch Allied. You’ll think about it as some point, based in no small part to those factors I just mentioned. You’ll find yourself in a moment of weakness and will be scrolling through movies, see the beautiful mugs of Pitt and Cotillard and think, let’s just give it a shot. Don’t give it a shot. Don’t give it a shot for giving it a shot. I am here not just to warn you and encourage you to steer clear of Allied, but to now lay out the entire movie for you in a completely spoilers-abound recap.

You’ll thank me.

Brad Pitt parachutes into a desert. His landing, much like the rest of Allied, is far from smooth and well-executed. He’s picked up by a car, given a suitcase and driven to Casablanca to meet a lady. Who is the lady? Dude it’s Marion Cotillard. Gasp, she’s a spy too. Maybe? I think so. I think he is. I don’t know what was up with the dude who drove the car. But Marion and Brad are pretending to be married. She has been in Casablanca working as an advance team of sorts, Brad’s cover story is that he is involved in phosphates or something and is in town for a few weeks. He’s Canadian, she’s French. Ha, ha, ha his French accent is terrible, like so not Parisian. And then he sleeps on the roof because apparently it’s where dudes in Casablanca go after sex. Is this a thing? Hold on, I’m going to Google it.

Googling Entertainment, courtesy of the Ghost of Paul Revere…

Okay, according to Reddit, no, no that’s not a thing.

Moving on!

Let’s cut to the chase. Brad and Marion’s goal is to assassinate a Nazi ambassador. Sounds normal, given the movie does take place during World War II. They need to get invited to this swanky party, hosted by Nazis, where the ambassador will be. I think Marion already scored an invite, so they need to get one for Brad. Wait, what has she been doing all this time? Never mind. They meet a Nazi, Brad pretends to not speak English (but HE DOES) and then somehow the decision to let him go hinges on him doing some fancy card work and sweet, now he’s invited. Again, what has Marion been doing in Casablanca this whole time besides smoking cigarettes and going to parties? Brad mentions something about her and her crew being involved in a dust-up in Paris a year or so ago, a dust-up she says that she was lucky to survive. They go to the desert, shoot some guns then have sex in their car, a swirling, whirling dust storm ranging outside that could be viewed as symbolic. Or just cool. Whatever.

Hey, Brad Pitt in a good movie. So it is possible. Good to know.

Now we go the party and I’m just going to fast forward through this and tell you that it was not a high point in the movie. Their big plan was to wait for a diversion (a car blows up outside) and then amidst the resulting chaos, kick over a table, grab the machine guns tapped beneath it and start shooting up the place. That’s it. That’s the whole plan. They encounter like, no resistance. At all. Brad gave them a 40% chance of survival beforehand, proving that he hadn’t read the script. As they speed away Brad turns to Marion and you know, given the amped up adrenaline of the situation, casually suggests that she return to London and be his wife, like for real.

Goodbye Casablanca.

God this movie is terrible.

Three weeks later: they get married.

One year later: they have a kid.

No really, that’s how it basically went in the movie.

The kid is born during a bombing because it’s still World War II and the baby was born amidst chaos and explosions and danger. Again, symbolism or showing off. Who cares. Everything is wonderful for our two love birds.

Or is it?

Yeah, who really cares.

But for the sake of finishing this and accomplishing my goal of sparing you the experience of you yourself watching Allied, I’ll wrap this up as quickly as possible.

Things aren’t wonderful. Brad’s bosses suspect Marion is a German spy. Brad says she isn’t a German spy. They say she is. He says she isn’t. They say she is. He kicks a chair. They say they’re going to do this thing where they give him false info, he plays it off like it’s real, leaves it where she can find it and if British Intelligence picks it up on the wire, she’s busted and he has to kill her because Brad, rules are rules.

Well Brad is bummed and suddenly every move Marion makes is suspicious. Like, why would she make sure the baby is asleep, then open the curtains of her room? I have a child and when she’s sleeping, I keep the curtains closed. I’m also not a spy. So, maybe Marion is? Like Brad, I’m confused. But you know, only a little. I’m pretty sure she’s a spy.

So while Brad waits to see if the plan worked, he decides to run around with Marion’s picture, asking people if she’s who she says she is. He goes to one dude and asks him, but that poor son of a bitch is completely missing one eye and his other eye is really only there for show, a gentle reminder that World War II was the worst dude. He’s no help. Brad’s next move is to get a pilot flying to France to track down a one-armed drunk and ask him. But hey, the one armed drunk is late and the pilot gets killed. Oh, this is getting troublesome. Then I think there’s a party at Brad and Marion’s house and her “creative-type” friends are there, bombing coke, boozing up a storm and dancing. The baby is sleeping upstairs and Marion might not be a spy, but I’m not sure either she or Brad are top notch parents because that seems irresponsible. Then an air fight breaks out in the sky above London. Did this happen a lot during World War II? Who the hell knows, it looked cool and that’s probably the point. Either way, a plane gets hit and everyone cheers, but holy shit that plane is like, coming right for us! The plane almost hits their house and crashes nearby. So they decide to get away, take their mind off of things. I think that’s for the best.

THEY GO ON A PICNIC IN THE SAME PARK WHERE THE PLANE CRASHED!

They’re not even trying.

Surprisingly, their delightful afternoon in a park with a crashed plane in it does little too soothe the turmoil raging in Brad’s belly. He decides to fly to France and find the one-armed drunk himself. He does. This movie is stupid. The drunk isn’t at the airfield, he’s been arrested so cool, let’s go bust him out of jail.

Good God. I’m getting bored just writing this. Here, let’s all take a second to watch the new Wonder Woman trailer. That looks pretty dope.

Okay, homestretch.

Brad finds the one-armed drunk, shows him Marion’s picture and the guy says it’s her. It’s all good; she’s not a spy. But wait, the one-armed drunk mumbles something about her playing the piano and in the lovely year that he’s known her, Marion hasn’t played the piano once. Damn it. She’s a spy. Or shy. Or a shy spy. Whatever, the Nazis are looking for cigarettes and it’s time to leave. Brad flies back to England, which might seem tricky to do seeing as how there is a war going on, but whatever, there are questions about piano playing that need to be answered.

Well, Marion does not play the piano. Yeah, sad stuff. She’s a spy, dude. Well, a spy doing spy stuff against her will, but a spy nonetheless. Brad’s gotta kill her because rules are rules, even for Brad Pitt. But no, NO. Brad won’t kill her. They’re going to run away, or fly away because planes take longer to start than cars and a slow getaway makes more sense from a narrative perspective because as Brad tries to start a plane to fly to safety, the cops or whatever they are come. It’s also raining and rain symbolizes death. Marion then kills herself. It’s not sad, but it’s meant to be. I feel like you could replace sad with good and you’d have the theme of this post- Allied, it’s not good, but it’s meant to be.

The movie ends with Brad walking with his daughter on a farm because he mentioned buying a farm earlier on when trying to bond with Marion and this movie is cheesy as hell, so of course it comes back in the end.

That was Allied.

It wasn’t very good.