Lots of potential but sadly disappointing

Rating: 5/10 (3 January 2014)

I was aware that this movie had received widely favourable reviews before I saw it. I went in with high hopes, as the plot seemed right up my alley. I was in the second week of my time off work and in a good mindset to enjoy a movie.
I am sorry to say that my optimism all but dissolved within the first 25 minutes. If I had to describe this movie in a word, it would be "tedious". There are very few movies I have considered walking out of to go and do something else, anything else, but this was one of them. But I held onto the last embers of my optimism, assuring myself that it must get better. Unfortunately, it didn't.
I found the characters somewhat uninteresting and unlikable; I couldn't bring myself to care about what happened to any of them. The only character I found to be slightly interesting was Rosalyn (played Jennifer Lawrence, whom I usually dislike but enjoyed the most in this movie). I am not sure why Amy Adams perpetually wore a plunging neckline. Interestingly, each one of the people I saw it with commented that it was distracting in that during the movie, instead of engaging with the content of the scene, we found ourselves wondering why she never wore anything else. It was just odd.
As for the story itself, it had a lot of potential. However, I found that the storyline got diluted by unnecessarily long (and at times, irrelevant) scenes and excessive dialogue. I was thankful when the movie ended and left dissatisfied, although the ending was (in my opinion) quite good. It was just a hard slog to get there and I really don't think it was worth it. I felt it was a lot of effort to sit through the movie and for little reward at the end.
As I said, I went in there expecting a great movie and actively trying to enjoy it because I knew I should. I'm really not sure why my experience was so different to everyone else's.