Save your money

Rating: 2/10 (18 April 2007)

This is the sort of silly anti-American ("It's all about oil!") lefty Hollywood film that confirms to foreigners and soft-headed Americans that the USA is the source of all evil in the world. We have no enemies except ourselves. And it's not even good film-making: long stretches of it are boring, confusing, illogical (the Ethiopia story makes no sense), totally unbelievable, and, when all else fails, the film-makers resort to explosions and over-the-top violence, including the justifying of torture and assassination as long as they are done for politically correct reasons. The makers did not even do their research on military equipment and tactics -- nearly all of it is wrong -- and know nothing about how the US government operates. Beatty's Senator is particularly laughable as is the Attorney General bit -- whoever wrote those parts knows nothing about the law or how government works. I am also tired of movies with Canada standing in for the USA. I can always tell.
Wahlberg's acting is muted and passable (although he mumbles a lot) but most of the rest of the actors are just mailing it in. Glover is particularly bad -- he looks worn out, tired and bored. I did not give it one star as some of the scenery is quite nice and some of the explosions not bad.
If you want a political paranoia film that has some class, suspense, and humor then you should go see Pakula's 1974 "Parallax View" which this film tries to rip off without success.