Shocked at the positive reviews; trite and predictable

Rating: 3/10 (28 March 2009)

OMG I am dumbfounded by all the glowing reviews. I think that I have to fault the script the most. Trite, formulaic, every "ironic" interaction was telegraphed to the viewer minutes ahead of time. When Colin Farrell's tough guy character is in the restaurant and has an interaction with an obnoxious weenie American, I've seen this exact scene so many times before... It was an agonizing 5 minutes as you sat through the predictable screen writing 101 set up moves culminating in the oh so ironic "punch" line. Painful. Colin Farrell's acting was way too forced and over-the-top for me, he seemed like he had to try way to hard, I found it distracting. Admittedly, the script and the directing are largely responsible here. Maybe I've seen too many movies, but this was just plain bad.