From the WSJ:

“Charlie Wilson’s War,” the film treatment of how a party-hearty Texas congressman teamed up with other Cold Warriors to humiliate the Soviet Empire and hasten its end, is a box-office success. After the failure of preachy political films, like “Lions for Lambs” and “Rendition,” Hollywood will credit the movie’s appeal, in part, to its witty dialogue and biting humor. Fair enough. But the film offers another lesson, for both Hollywood and Washington: Good things can happen when principle trumps partisanship.

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Mr. Wilson, 74, is now mending nicely from a heart transplant. He is generous with praise for his comrades-in-skulduggery. “We won because there was no partisanship or damaging leaks,” he emphasizes. But he believes that nothing like the Afghan operation could survive today’s poisonous Washington atmosphere.

Tom Hanks, who plays Mr. Wilson in the film, has fretted that he, screenwriter Aaron Sorkin and director Mike Nichols will be attacked by the right as “a bunch of Democrats who are taking potshots at the war in Iraq.” He needn’t worry. Mr. Hanks and his fellow filmmakers have produced a rousing paean to America’s can-do spirit. They have resisted the temptation to comment on any current U.S. foreign policy missteps and highlighted how, not so long ago, one ornery congressman and a few friends helped change the world.