Technically good but let down by acting and dialogue

Rating: 6/10 (9 July 2012)

I'll begin with the positives. Technically speaking this is an excellent film. Excellently directed, haunting imagery- an abandoned New York being particularly haunting- and an absolute fantastic soundtrack. In fact the soundtrack is easily the best thing about this film. It is almost entirely pitch perfect with excellent artists such as Radiohead, REM, Jeff Buckley and Paul McCartney all seamlessly working into the film.
Now the drawbacks. The acting in this film is not exactly great. Cameron Diaz tries her hardest but her character is very little for a character to do and she just ends up a serious of clichés. Penelope Cruz's character can't seem to match up to her one in the original and just leaves the viewer baffled as to what all the fuss is about. Worst of all however is Tom Cruise himself. I'm not sure if this is just a personal problem I have with Cruise or not. I enjoyed him in Magnolia but everything else he's been in has just annoyed me. He's excellent at playing the cocky spoilt rich kid role that he's been perfecting all his career but when his character takes a dark turn Cruise just doesn't have the chops to pull it off. His brooding in the interrogation scenes is almost unwatchable.
Worst of all, however, is the dialogue. It is clunky and is almost embarrassing when it's being spoken. See for example the attempts to explain the film at the end. It is one of the most boring ways possible to finish a film just by having a character you have barely met lifelessly explain it all. Line after line of it is spewed out by the actors but it never really seems to be going anyone.
This is a great concept for a film and was done exquisitely well .... in the original. For anyone interested in the film I'd recommend the original by far.