At this rate, people are going to start asking John Cusack - a la "High Fidelity's" Rob Gordon - to come up with his list of "Top Five Movies I've Made About Iraq."

"War, Inc." a political satire about an assassin on a political mission in a war-torn Middle Eastern country, follows on the heels of Cusack's turn as the widower of a soldier killed in Iraq in "Grace is Gone." The 42-year-old actor-writer produced both films through his New Crime Productions. "War, Inc." opens in New York and L.A. today.

Admittedly, Cusack's still got a ways to go before fleshing out a topical Rob Gordon Top 5 list, but the slacker-ish romantic comedy heroes Cusack has made a career playing in "Say Anything..." "Must Love Dogs" and "High Fidelity" have fallen away of late.

So be it, says Cusack, who maintains that the times are ripe for outrage and satire. "War, Inc." suggests that American-led conflicts are as much an opportunity to boost the coffers of global corporations as they are a means of accomplishing a Middle East land grab. Spreading democracy or protecting ourselves against weapons of mass destruction aren't part of the equation.

And Cusack, who doesn't mince words during an interview in his Venice office, has had enough.

"Maybe George Bush does think God talks to him, but I don't know what version of Jesus Christ he could pray to that would endorse war as a choice. To me, growing up Catholic, that's obscene," says Cusack. "But you think, `'Why would they do that?' It's so much more shocking that (the administration) views the whole idea of government and war itself as a for-profit business. I didn't sign up for that.

"I thought about making a movie, and putting an absurdity lens on things," he continues. "If you just did a drama, it would be so depressing you would never get out of bed. Satire is supposed to take on that stuff."

Absurdity, then, it is. Shot low budget in Bulgaria, "War, Inc." finds a disaffected hit man named Hauser (played by Cusack) dispatched to the fictional nation of Turaqistan to kill an oil minister called Omar Sharif. A private American corporation is occupying the country, and the disaffected Hauser - who drinks straight shots of Tabasco sauce - poses as a trade show producer charged with orchestrating the wedding of a Central Asian pop star (Hilary Duff). A left-wing journalist named Hegalhuzen (Marisa Tomei) may be just the ticket to get Hauser out of his funk. If he can stay alive, that is.

Fights, explosions and send-ups aplenty ensue. Amputee Rockettes anyone?

"I think outrage was the basis for it," says co-writer Jeremy Pikser. "People have been asking me whether we did this as a comedy to sweeten the pill. How can you portray how outrageous the situation is without being outrageous? George Bush is president of the United States. That's a joke right there. You have to laugh about it or cry, and I didn't want to cry about it."

Pikser signed on for "War, Inc" following a call from Cusack, who had been an admirer of the Warren Beatty 1998 political satire "Bulworth," which Pikser co-wrote.

"He does that. He calls people whose work he admires," Pikser says of Cusack. "Anybody who loves `Bulworth' is a friend of mine."

When it's suggested that it is the odd film indeed that features former 'tween princess Duff and Ben Kingsley in the same cast, Cusack returns, "Yeah, and I get kissed by both of them."

"I thought, Let's take the punk-rock, do-it-yourself approach with like a fourth the money I've had for some of the other flicks I've done," says Cusack. "I said, `Who wants to go to Bulgaria?' I think everybody wanted to be a part of kind of mocking the ideology that turns every part of America into a for-profit military company."

"John made this project happen. There's really no other way to put it," adds director Joshua Seftel. "That was sort of the tone of the mission: Let's just get this film made by hook or by crook."

Since the film's completion, Cusack has been equally bullish about spreading the word. In addition to the talk-show circuit, Cusack has become a regular blogger on The Huffington Post, including a series of interviews he conducted with Naomi Klein, author of "The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism."

The film, Cusack and Seftel both acknowledge, will need all the help it can get seeing as how a little movie about a certain fedora-wearing archaeologist figures to burn up most of the box office.

"War, Inc." is - by summer standards - a "little movie" that will either be propelled by word of mouth or be next week's curiosity title on the DVD shelves. The fact that Cusack and Co. are taking on a several-years-old campaign is another hurdle, as Iraq movies haven't exactly been lighting up the box-office gross.

All the same, Cusack thinks the election season spike may work in "War, Inc.'s" favor.

"I don't think the movie has changed that much, but I think people's perception of it has," says Cusack who took "War, Inc." to the Tribeca Film Festival. "I think maybe the toxicity of it all has gotten to the point where people are just tired."

Lest his audience get too prepared for a political screed, Cusack and his writers also had butt-kicking action and samurai codes of honor on the brain. Throw in a little Batman dark warrior action, and you wouldn't be far off the mark, says Cusack who played a different kind of dispirited assassin in 1997's "Grosse Pointe Blank."

As for Cusack being an unlikely messenger of political criticism, the actor-writer shrugs.

"My dad said if he lived right he could tell anyone to go to hell," says Cusack whose father, Dick, was also an actor. "I haven't lived that much right, and I'm not like my father, but war profiteers are people who want to destroy this country and the very ideals of America. I'm fine telling them to go to hell."

Back it up. You "haven't lived right"?

"I can't throw stones at glass houses. I'm not a saint. I make movies," Cusack returns. "I have my life and I have a corporation, but it ain't subsidized by tax dollars and it ain't getting anybody killed."

-- Evan Henerson