Painfully mediocre

Rating: Null/10 (17 November 2003)

I didn't think that '8 Mile' was going to be great. Eminem doesn't impress me, and neither does his sad life story. In fact, I couldn't care less. I went to this movie because my mate likes Eminem and she dragged me into it. Fine. I did, however, expect to be entertained, since that's about all that Eminem does. Unfortunately, I spent the entire movie waiting for something to happen, but of course, nothing really did. The climax didn't feel like a climax (didn't even know it was a climax until the movie ended) and maybe it was the direction or the script, but I couldn't get into the movie at all. There wasn't a single moment in which I felt like I was part of the story; in the entire time, the movie remained a movie, and I remained very, very detached.
Eminem's acting was surprisingly good. He has incredibly expressive eyes and he used it to his full advantage. Brittany Murphy was wasted, and I can't remember who else appeared but they obviously didn't make an impact. The rap scenes (yeah, whatever) didn't do much for me either. Sure, I don't like rap, but I did expect them to be more exciting than... that.

Like I said, I kept waiting for something to happen, but nothing ever did. The script felt way too disjointed and disconnected. The only thing that I took away from the movie was that Eminem can kind of act.

In short, '8 Mile' is horribly overrated.