This film is given too much praise

Rating: 6/10 (13 January 2005)

To me The Garden State is a film which tries too much to be artistic. Some scenes with some coldplay/Keane music in the background don't make a movie artistic.
I have the feeling that I know what director and writer Zach Braff wanted to do, but he failed by wanting it too much. This movie looks likes a nice, artistic, honest movie about a young man who returns to his home after nine years and discovers himself. The strange characters, his old friends, put in the humour. But the story is too cliché. As are the dialog. The dialog aren't good enough to keep my attention. The dialog want to learn us about live or should be romantic, but they aren't. Come on, I've seen this in other movies a hundred times.
I will try to explain it:When I watched this movie I had the feeling I had seen it all before, but then slightly different. Of course almost every movie has this, but in this movie I couldn't get rid of this feeling. I also had the feeling that the scenes with the music and the shots of Jersey were too much planned. It didn't really add much to the story. It is a movie that is written to be special instead of just being special. And not only that, the story isn't good enough to get away with the things I said above. That is why it has failed in my opinion. I don't understand why it has such a high rating here on IMDb.
It is not a bad movie, but it is not as good as the voters on IMDb say.