Scott Eastwood stars, Jamie Foxx baffles, and Robert De Niro cashes a check in “Tin Soldier”, one of the most confounding features to reach a screen this year. While it’s technically an action thriller, finding a fitting category for it is a challenge. That’s because this confection is all over the map, attempting to be a little bit of everything but ultimately landing nowhere.

It’s hard to believe this ever looked good on paper, but something about “Tin Soldier” drew Eastwood and two Academy Award winners. The film is directed by Brad Furman who is helming his first feature since 2018’s “City of Lies”. He does everything he can to make something at least slightly cohesive. But even at under 80 minutes, his film has a difficult time generating or sustaining any momentum. That’s because the script (written by the trio of Furman, Jess Fuerst, and Pablo Fenjves) fails to develop into anything compelling or narratively functional.

Seventeen years prior, a decorated naval officer named Leon K. Prudhomme (Foxx) founded a PTSD treatment center for veterans. He called it THE PROGRAM. But a secret FBI investigation discovered Prudhomme was actually forming a heavily armed anti-government cult. He reinvented himself as a charismatic (and unintentionally goofy) revolutionary called The Bokushi. And all indications point to his cult stockpiling chemical weapons.

Out of fear that a domestic terror attack is imminent, the FBI begin planning a raid on the Bokushi’s remote mountain compound (think Waco, 1993). But before they do, a covert tactical team organized by Emmanuel Ashburn (De Niro) is secretly organizing an unsanctioned mission to infiltrate the compound and take out the Bokushi before things escalate.

To guide his team, Ashburn approaches Nash Cavanaugh (Eastwood), a disheveled military vet and former member of Prudhomme’s cult. Nash struggles mightily with PTSD, a result of his time at war and in the Bokushi’s outfit. Nash wants no part of Ashburn’s mission. But when he hears his wife Evoli (Nora Arnezeder), who was presumed killed during his escape, may actually be alive, Nash agrees to join the operation with hopes of rescuing his wife.

From there the movie moves forward in the most mechanical way imaginable. It jumps from point to point with very little buildup and even less emotion. Furman makes an effort to break things up, but it mostly comes through instances of awkward narration and jarring flashbacks, none of which add much the story (there’s one unintentionally bonkers flashback of Foxx giving a musical performance that plays like an “In Living Color” sketch). Meanwhile other actors like John Leguizamo and Shamier Anderson do little more than add some familiar faces.

Not that it was ever fully together, but things completely fall apart in the final act where any attempt at an explosive finish gives way to utter absurdity. We get a laughably easy infiltration, a goofy cult ritual, and a hysterically bad monologue. And if that wasn’t enough, the story wraps up with a preposterous showdown in….a gladiator arena.

To its credit, there are a few striking locations, flashes of clever cinematography, and a couple of decent action sequences. But overall, “Tin Soldier” features more bad haircuts than good scenes. And no amount of effort can make this AI-quality creation remotely entertaining or inspired. “Tin Soldier” is in select theaters now and releases on VOD September 30th.

VERDICT – 1 STAR