This movie is excellently directed and edited. In fact the editing is crisp and used intelligently to build the story. The flash-back scenes are well done and give good insights into alternative perspectives about what a child understands of complex adult relationships.

There are some serious flaws though. This film follows in the footsteps of other modern (or post-modern) films in that it seems to hold the audience at arms length. There is a clear distance between the story and the viewer that results in a lack of any feelings of compassion for the main characters.

The end feels like an anti-climax but the scenes with Vanessa Redgrave lift the film just at the right moment. She clearly shines as someone who knows the craft of acting inside out and for a brief moment you feel something for the story.

This movie is a lot like a heating a kettle of water at the top of a high mountain – it never quite reaches boiling point. It gets lukewarm at best and the tea it makes is not that tasty.

There is a strong plot and the cinematography is good but…the performances are lukewarm. Russell Crowe mumbles through most of the film and although he is supposed to be the baddest of bad, bad men he is about as scary as someone who is not very scary.

As a psychopath he does not come over as very psychotic. He has a good side of course demonstrated by his love of sketching and excellent table manners. Also he rescues his captors from the evil Injuns and the nutty mountain men. All in all he’s a rough tough lovable type who just happens to be in with the wrong crowd. Not to worry he sorts them all out in the end.

On the other side the Christian Bale is the weakling, loser who is despised by his wife (small underplayed role), his children but worst of all Russell Crowe likes him.

Of course they become buddies and develop a kind of mutual respect.

The main problem with this movie apart from the dull performances is it can’t figure out what kind of film it is. New style 21st century western or old fashioned 50’s western. This is a remake of a 1957 film starring Glenn Ford and this version seems heavily rooted in the past. In some ways it feels like an old Randolph Scott movie where the bad guy is not really that bad.

See the original and ignore this one. I wish I had.

The bottom line is, this is a great film.

4 North African men join the French army to help defeat the Nazi’s and for the glory of their Motherland. The film charts their first faltering days in combat in Italy through France and the end of the war.

The pace of the film is unhurried (not boring) which allows time for the characters to develop. The fighting action is sporadic and moves the plot on to the next phase of the story.

I would thoroughly recommend this film for the writing, the plotting, the characters and for revealing a little bit of hidden history.

Watch this you won’t regret it.

This is a great little film. The plot is a bit crazy but that is not a problem. The characters are really well defined and each has been fully written so that they are believable and interesting in their own right.

The main character John Person is laid back for most of the movie even though he encounters stranger and stranger people and situations.

He is waiting for a guy called The Cowboy who he has been paid $27,000 to pass on a blue suitcase. Unfortunately the cowboy is played by Sean Bean – which has got to be a weird in-joke by the director because as we all know Mr Bean is a shite actor.

Overall this is a really enjoyable film with some sparkling lines and great characters. Forgive the plot especially toward the end and imagine Sean Bean is someone else and this could be one of the best movies you have ever seen…

I started to watch this but after about 20 minutes I fell into a very deep sleep and did not wake up until nearly the end of the movie. Now this behaviour is not necessarily a reflection on the film as such but an indication of how tired I was when I watched it.

On the other hand I did realise that I normally fall asleep when the Simpsons is on TV or I turn it over to watch something else or more usually I get the dinner on.

So, maybe it was just a bit dull. I decided not to watch it over again, you’ll need to decide for yourself…

This movie is great.

The stark black and white photography coupled with the fantastic performances and riveting story line makes this one a real noir classic.

The main characters all try to take control of their destiny by using each other but chance intervenes and the best laid plans start to unravel with tragic consequences for all.

This film demonstrates (once again) that director’s do not need hour’s worth of celluloid or several sequels and prequels to get a great story across. 90 minutes is more than enough…

Where does one start writing about this movie? This has got to be one of the best action movies of all time and a great psychological and philosophical study of the human condition.

The first hour is based in a small down at heel town in an unnamed South American country populated almost entirely by dodgy down at heel ‘tramps’, criminals and men with a story that they don’t want to tell.

Everyone seems to have ended up in this town by accident or expediency and once there can’t escape due to lack of funds and with no way of raising any cash.

An oil rig fire provides the opportunity for four characters to earn $2000 each so that they can escape back to civilization. Of course it’s not as easy as it seems as the drivers have to transport two tons of liquid nitro-glycerine.

The American company doing the hiring know they are paying under the odds by employing non-union drivers and they provide trucks without proper suspension.

What follows is a riveting nerve jangling 300 mile journey on some of the worst roads around.

I would thoroughly recommend this film to anyone who wants to see a cracking movie but also to those in Hollywood who have forgotten how to keep human relationships the central point in an action film.

I agree with the two other reviews here. After seeing the first Fantastic Four film this one seemed more ‘compact’ but that’s not a bad thing in these days where graphic novel based movies seem to run for a minimum of three hours.

There is a good balance of action and human interest – although the “we need to live a normal life” story is a bit silly.

Also, by the end of the film Jessica Alba looks about 12 years old which is a bit strange. The Silver Sufer character is really cool in this film but I am not sure whether there was a clear opening to a third film but maybe that’s a good thing…

This is a good movie and definitely worth watching.

Excellent performances, good plotting and the ‘backwards/forwards’, or flashback scenes that link to the current scenes is done really well. The film explores corruption, crime, revenge and doing the right thing.

This is how Jindabyne should have been.

What can one say about this dull, portentous, houmourless, woodenly acted, unconvincing, tedious, Deliverance wannabe and thoroughly boring movie?

Well, avoid it I suppose and do something more interesting.

Actually one question that sprung to mind when starting to watch this was, “Is Australian film the new French film now that French film seems to be more like American film?”