Not enough Character development

Rating: 4/10 (11 September 2013)

Overall, This movie was bad in my opinion. I'm not sure why so many people gave it high ratings and seemingly overlooked all of its flaws. I'm assuming Clint Eastwood fans got caught up in his acting performance.
The movie begins and ends with Clint Eastwood's character while almost every other character is uni-dimensional with little or no depth at all. The kids from the local gangs might as well be witches from your typical fairytale. They are just about as mean and despicable as the storyline needs them to be with no context behind their actions. There's a random scene where (one of the key characters) a Hmong-American girl walks with her white boyfriend, and encounters a group of 3 African American kids who appear to be some sort of gang. The incredibly predictable interaction is just a bunch of awkward cliché lines thrown back and forth between the white guy and the gang. But of course, Clint Eastwood magically appears at the right time to save the girl from the evil gang. That scene came out of nowhere and completely threw me off balance. Sadly, it wasn't just a bad scene, it pretty much set the tone for the rest of the movie.
The best way to describe this film would be something stuck between a heavy drama and a feel good story. Every time the story threatens to get too dramatic, you suddenly get pulled back into the "feel good" setting and vice versa. It goes head on on heavy subjects like racism, gangs, life and death, hatred, and war, yet it doesn't fully develop on any of them. One thing that really bothered me was: Why would Thao's cousin (the main "antagonist") attempt to murder members of his own family following Clint's assault. He basically sprayed his auntie's house with bullets, and raped or ordered the rape and/or assault of Taoh's sister (his own cousin!?). and we know nothing about who he is or his true motivations.