OK but nothing more than that

Rating: Null/10 (25 September 2005)

Having seen his father struggle to pay the bills despite working like a dog, George Jung decides never to be poor. As a young man he moves out to the West Coast and discovers sun, sex and drugs in a big way. Without a job to bring in money, George and his friends start selling weed locally before realising the market back east in the university areas. From here he grows within his market and is soon flying in larger amounts, before eventually getting captured. However jail brings more opportunities as his cellmate provides a connection to a supply of cocaine and a whole different world.
As far back as it could remember, this film wanted to be Goodfellas. From the very start and regularly all the way through this film has the feel of that film although it is never as good as the film that it seems to emulate. The approach is the same and it more or less works but only enough to keep things moving and never to the point where it is a great film. I'm not sure why but it doesn't flow naturally enough and feels longer than it really is, while at the same time never being weighty enough to be the crime semi-epic that it aspires to be at times. It isn't dull by any means but it just didn't do it for me and I didn't get engaged by it to the degree that I had hoped I would. The direction is OK but the feeling that Demme watched Goodfellas about 20 times before making this just kept putting me off.
Depp's performance is serviceable but for someone of his ability this is not good enough. For the majority of the film it looks like he has fallen into his hair and he seems just as unnatural within his skin  never able to really draw out a character of any genuine depth. Cruz comes late in the game and does liven things up with a flamboyant performance but she doesn't have any depth either. Support from Liotta is OK but he doesn't manage to do much with a "working stiff" character and Griffiths just doesn't look old enough for her character. The rest of the cast are OK but really the film is Depp's and it speaks volumes that he doesn't dominate it in the way he has with other films.
Overall this is an OK film but it is not slick, engaging or deep enough to be as good as the films that it clearly thinks it can match. The cast all work but don't make much impact and Demme's direction feels copied from other, better, directors. OK but not great.