Could have been so much better

Rating: 4/10 (4 December 2010)

I really wanted to like this movie, with its stellar cast and creative and quirky concept. Featuring Ewan MacGregor, George Clooney and Kevin Spacey (who's been gone for far too long) I imagined a blend of "Big Fish," "Inglorious Basterds" and "Burn After Reading," all of which were slightly self-indulgent but more than made up for it with the multi-layered characters, production values, and engaging plot lines. This film had all of the intellectual smugness of those movies but none of the wit. It wanders directionless and completely fails to engage, not just a stream of consciousness but a series of puddles. The characters are shallow, dull stereotypes -- Jeff Daniels as the New Age hippie (and the most nails-on-a-chalkboard irritating of them all), Ewan MacGregor the intrigued naive, George the straight-faced convert. The idea of conducting a war through the use of questionable psychic abilities could have been anywhere from laugh-out-loud funny to well-played dark comedy, and indeed, it seems that the movie tries for the entire range of comic effect, but it doesn't succeed in any. If you're dying to see the comic stylings of George Clooney, try the classic "O Brother, Where Art Thou?" (or the aforementioned "Burn After Reading," which features the wonderful Frances McDormand and Brad Pitt as a dim personal trainer).