Why do so many people like this movie

Rating: Null/10 (27 July 2003)

Am I the only one that hates this movie? To me it was an utter failure on every level, with Edward Norton reduced to a taunting brat and Donald Sutherland playing the all-knowing "father figure" for maybe the zillionth time in his career. I cant believe standards have fallen so that people can walk out of films as dumb, formulaic and shallow as this and tell themselves they've been entertained. Since watching The Italian Job, I've revisited recent heist pics like Ronin, Mission: Impossible and The Score, and saw what the Italian Job could have been. This film cant even fall back on mindless action, since it's much-hyped chase scene with the mini coopers felt like a slight tremor after experiencing the earth-shattering action sequences offered by films like "The Matrix Reloaded", or to a much lesser extent "The Fast and the Furious" or "Bad Boys 2". Those films may have been many things, but at least they tried to up the ante instead of retiring to formula and copying everybody else. Believe me, people, I am not a film elitist to say the least...I enjoy trash as long as it's good trash, and The Italian Job is not that. Even Triple X, which I thoroughly loathed after leaving the theater, tried to do it's own thing...The Italian Job doesnt have any balls, in addition to wit, skill or exctitement.