Great Acting, Bad Screenplay

Rating: Null/10 (27 December 2006)

I have no idea in why this won Best Picture and had so many great reviews. Here, every character is either racist or a victim of racism, and if he/she is a racist it's because there's a reason, some sort of trauma in his past. Every character is one-dimensional and learns a lesson in the end. The dialogs sound fake, and the ONLY theme is racism, racism, racism. That even makes it less realist because people tend to speak about several subjects. Paul Haggis seems to think people will only understand the message if he repeats it all the time. All with me "Racism is bad, racism is bad, racism is bad". Now repeat this 500 times and you'll have a good part of this movie done. Even if obviously this is an important message, you don't need it to be thrown into your face. The stories come together in unnatural way, using to many coincidences, making it look false and predictable after some time. The changes some of the characters go through in the end are ridiculous and there's no reason for the to happen. Even if this is not a boring movie, it tries too hard to get you to feel something. If the characters had been better this would have been possibly a good movie. I'm not saying all were bad; a few had a certain dimension and their struggles were touching.
The acting is the best thing about this movie. All the actors are very talented and make the most out of their parts. Don Cheadle, Matt Dillon, Michael Peña, Thandie Newton, Terrence Howard and Sandra Bullock (during the first part of the movie) were very god. The worst performance was by Ludicrous, who just seemed too self-conscious and fake to me.
Paul haggis direction is lame.I know he lacks experience, but I think this movie needed a raw, realistic style, not the emotionally manipulative shots used. Al the slow moving scenes, the bad use of sound and the still camera in angles that lack interest are useless.
The technicals are good. The editing is simple and common in this type of movie, not original but well executed. The music is well chosen and beautiful. The photography, even if sometimes it should have been dirtier locking, creates some images with the right mood. Overall, this is NOT a great movie or even worthwhile, but it has a bunch of good performances and a good message, even if badly transmitted.