i don't get the fuss

Rating: Null/10 (31 December 2004)

I went to see Million Dollar Baby with every expectation of being entertained, maybe even exhilarated by the end-of-year accolades for what, in Toronto, was essentially unheralded and unhyped. Well, I tried. And after half the film I was distracted by the many plaudits it has earned, the number of #1 ratings it has accumulated from critics everywhere. I found the movie formulaic in the extreme, predictable at every turn, written with the sophistication of a middling junior high school student and portentous when it wasn't pretentious. We won't begin to discuss Mr. Eastwood's score. Clichés tumble over each other and the narrative device, better by little than phone conversations that tie up creaky plots, made me squirrelly. And all the earnest acting, barely audible grunts and endless fadeout shots made for another ersatz experience in Hollywood. Is the American scene so desperate for an auteur, someone they can claim has the rights to immortality, that they leap over themselves to find a winner? Sideways makes this movie look like kid's play. A Very Long Engagement is head and shoulders above this corny and Oscar-focused pulp film. And sure, it will win plenty of awards, much money will be made from the fraudulent effort to tell a story that we could have done ourselves. So, what's all the fuss about?