Completely OVERRATED, and often cliché!

Rating: 1/10 (10 February 2005)

Don't get me wrong, this movie is o.k. But it is completely overrated by professional and amateur movie reviewers alike. It is NOT the best film of the year, but it probably is in the top 10.
No sense in giving away any spoilers or much of the plot. However, the prevalence of spoiler warnings should let you know that there is a surprise gimmick at the end of the movie. Nice try Clint, but I ain't buying.
The acting is above-average, but by no means transcendent. Swank does well enough, and I'm not sure whether her unbelievable "golly-gee Boss" portrayal of the character comes from her or from the writer, but whomever is responsible should be cursed with bad gas (because that is what happened to me after consuming 1 1/2 hours of that sickly sweet garbage dialogue). Let's see Swank's poor white trash character travels 1500 miles to LA with no support, no money, no apparent skills, and was raised in a family of criminals, scoundrels, and welfare cheats. HOWEVER, we are supposed to believe she is some sort of saint, with a heart of gold, good morals and manners, hardworking and thrifty, and who talks like a house slave. Yeah, sure. If you had told me she was hooking or in the porn industry because she was down on her luck, fine. Bottom line, Swank's character has depth that is a mile wide and an inch deep. She says pithy fortune cookie type things, but we are never let in on how she reaches such sage realizations. Nice....but hooey.
Clint's character is o.k., and he plays him with his regular steadiness. He plays a grouchy old man, but everyone knows that deep down he has a heart of gold and is grouchy because he cares TOO MUCH rather than too little. Clint's buddy relationship with the Morgan Freeman character is a bit false. They did the same buddy thing in Unforgiven, but this time they didn't spend enough time developing the relationship (at least from Clint's perspective).
Morgan Freeman is great per usual, but really gets the shaft with this character. For anyone who's seen The Big Picture, you can just imagine how this movie was developed. They wanted Freeman in it, but didn't bother to give him a character worth playing. Cobble together all his popular roles as the wise and good natured black man (e.g. Shawshank, Seven, Driving Miss Daisy, Kiss the Girls, and Glory) and you get the same thing here. No surprises. The use of his voice as a narrator is pulled straight out of Shawshank, and despite the fact that his voice has a depth, quality, and familiarity second only, perhaps, to James Earl Jones, the narration doesn't work that well and primarily serves to let the director off the hook for actually showing us something (instead of merely telling us). It's too bad really.
There are some minor characters, but they aren't relevant and do not advance the movie but rather serve merely as a pleasant distraction.
Bottom line: a likable movie, but not a great one. If it gets any Oscars, it will be because of the hype and not the movie or the performances.