Reviews

I rate this movie with an 8 despite some critical flaws. It is quite well directed, shot in bright colors, and pervaded by the languid, hot and humid atmosphere of the tropics. I have never been to the New Orleans portrayed here (and regretfully, never will) but it feels as I had imagined it. The story is basically a character study with a plot that is entirely predictable. Although psychologically sound on paper, it just doesn't seem to work for me, mainly because Macht and Travolta are entirely miscast.

Travolta looks ridiculous with his artificial gray hair. He lacks all the manners and movement characteristic of alcoholics, and is almost comic in his sorry attempts. He is also completely unbelievable as the disgraced professor of English literature. Gabriel Macht plays the protégé who by some contrived twist is responsible for his professor's fall and has to write the latter's biography in order to redeem himself and absolve his mentor. But Macht is just too nice a guy to play this guilt-driven alcoholic writer, as he lacks the bitterness and edge the part requires. Some of the acting, especially by Dane Rhodes (as Cecil) is downright ridiculous. The only bright spot, and it is very bright, is Scarlett Johannson who by here subtle acting almost singlehandedly saves this movie.

Apart from Johannson and the general atmosphere of this movie, some dialogs are quite good and the soundtrack is great and unbelievably, these factors compensate some very crucial mistakes.

The Decalogue is without doubt a monument of movie history. The ten films are apparently based on the ten commandments, but this relationship is tentative. Kieslowski himself commented that "the films should be influenced by the individual Commandments to the same degree that the Commandments influence our daily lives". The amazing thing about them is that they are much more than a series of abstract cinematic emblems. Assisted by superlative acting, they acquire each their own depth, their own real personalities and complex dilemmas. Kieslowski presents a cinematic view of morality that is about as sophisticated as it gets. A grand achievement of one of the great film-makers of the twentieth century.

I have to disagree with just about every comment on this board. This is NOT a touching story of a tragic misfit who resorts to violence after a life of disappointment and exclusion. This movie contains NO social or political comment of any serious kind. Instead, it follows for a dreary hour and a half the descent of an utterly unlikeable loser. There is no tragedy without sympathy, and Penn's Sam Bicke elicits nor deserves any.

His comments on American society are childish and clichéd ("Mr. Bernstein, I just want my piece of the American Dream") and so is his motive for going after the White House ("If history teaches us anything it's that you have got to get the seat of government") His 'criticism' of the salesman's dishonesty (would anyone hire Penn's Bicke as a salesperson?) is quite pedestrian. Yeah, sure, salesmen lie, most people do, but Bicke's own ideas on 'honest' salesmanship are just plain stupid.

Mueller uses hand camera's to convey a phony sense of realism. But Penn, surely one of the most gifted actors of his generation, squanders his talent here on a flat, uninteresting character. There is no inner conflict, no ambiguity, there is only this inept salesperson whose wife has left him (we never really learn why, although we do of course understand perfectly) and who bemoans his own failures at night in spoken monologues whining for his piece of the American dream, or whatever.

If this movie is supposed to be a character study (Taxi Driver comes to mind, of course), the character under study is either too uninteresting, the screenplay is too dull, or (most likely) both.

If this is supposed to be a social comment on American society in general, it is not only inept, it is rather silly. Bicke is just too plain stupid to sensibly motivate his rancor, resorting to mind-numbing platitudes like "Mr. Bernstein Sir, there are times that I have felt alone on this planet. And that's how they want us, isn't it? Alone. Divided. Weak".

Well, if I was one of 'them', I would certainly prefer them (portrayed) as stupid and ignorant as Bicke

Infantile yet pretentious war-movie with racist and neo-colonial undertones about an insubordinate US-lieutenant and a handful o' marines valiantly saving a bunch of nameless, speechless and helpless African blacks from an even bigger bunch of nameless, speechless yet bloodthirsty Muslim African blacks.

The realism in this movie is bought on the cheap by images of ethnic cleansing and random cruelty. The acting consists mostly of the usual stern looks and grave growls with the predictable interlude of sentimental, low-voiced pep-talk. Fighting scenes are generally well-directed yet entirely improbable, with navy-seals bringing multiple grenades, sniper-rifles and shotguns on a routine, one-day mission.

Self-gratification, no doubt, for the average American patriot. An insult, though, to the people of Africa and a waste of time for the rest of the world.