Spielberg at His Bottom of the Barrel Worst

Rating: 1/10 (17 July 2009)

Absolutely horrendous film from Steven Spielberg, perhaps his worst ever.
Spielberg was in white guilt mode when he made this, yes, the same mode that brought us his zip-a-dee-doo-dah version of "The Color Purple," though that film looks like "Lawrence of Arabia" compared to this.
Spielberg works so hard to make his whites look like caricature buffoons and his blacks like righteous nobles that he ends up treating his audience like a bunch of morons who aren't able to draw any conclusions for themselves. Anthony Hopkins hams it up to the high heavens as John Quincy Adams while Matthew M. (I don't feel like looking up the correct spelling of his name) looks dazed and lost underneath his period wig. Newcomer Djimon Hounsou plays a mutinous slave who proved to movie audiences how loud he could yell, and that's been the predominant quality in every performance he's given since.
This one is woeful; I challenge you to make it through.
Grade: F