I Guess I Didn't See What They All Did

Rating: 4/10 (26 December 2006)

This was an OK movie, just OK. I group of friends and I went to see it and all of us agreed, it was too long- rather the pacing was terrible- and the characters lacked any moments that allowed you to connect with them. The only character I could even identify with was the wife, who was gone after the first 1/4 of the film. I'm not saying that the actors were bad or the story idea was bad, but its execution was far from great and nowhere near worthy the Oscar buzz that people say this is going to generate. Sorry to be a downer on a movie that so many people enjoyed, I just did not think it was any good. I just couldn't feel anything for Will Smith's character or his son, and I think that this is because of the point when the movie enters their lives, it builds very little if no back story. We knew nothing of these people except that they were poor, struggling and had a son...sounds like a lot of other movies that I've seen. And while, yes, this movies was "based" on actual events, it was predictable with only one moving moment, which occurred 3 minutes before the end of the film.