I’ll admit it. Proudly. The Monkey and I are among the few who actually liked Ang Lee’s “flawed” 2003 silver screen adaptation of the Marvel Comics behometh super “hero” - the Hulk. I say flawed because it is generally accepted that Lee’s take on the character was a failure in the minds of critics and fans, as well as a “failure” at the box office.

The new film, titled “The Incredible Hulk,” perhaps as an homage to the 1970’s Bill Bixby television show and as a means to distinguish it from the monosyllablic title of Ang Lee’s film, has generally received rather positive reviews, earning a 66% fresh “tomatometer” rating at www.rottentomatoes.com (Ang Lee’s “Hulk” registers at 61% fresh). Many reviewers are lauding the film for delivering more action, sans the “psycho-babble” from the previous entry, in addition to tying neatly into the “Marvel Cinematic Universe” created in the vastly superior film, “Iron Man.”

Marvel Studios

It should be noted that “Iron Man” and “The Incredible Hulk” are the first two features released by Marvel Studios. Previous Marvel superhero adaptations (X-Men, Spiderman, Daredevil) were released by separate studios, with Marvel retaining very little creative control over their properties. In an effort to exert more creative license and to establish a cohesive, interconnected “universe” that mirrors the integrity and continuity of the comics, Marvel started up its own independent movie studio and will be releasing a slate of independently produced films to follow up their first two releases over the coming years. Rumor has it Captain America and The Avengers are next, the latter most likely featuring Iron Man, the Hulk, and Captain America, among others.

The Myth of Ang Lee’s “Hulk” at the Box Office

Ang Lee’s “Hulk” had a larger opening weekend draw than the Ed Norton re-boot, earning $62 million in its opening weekend back in 2003, compared to the “Incredible Hulk” earning $55 million over the weekend of June 13, 2008. Taking inflation into account (and God knows the dollar has lost a few ticks in the past couple of years), the original film’s numbers would likely be even higher by today’s standards, perhaps 10% or more.

To put those opening weekend numbers into perspective, Ang Lee’s “Hulk” currently stands as the #2 all-time opening weekend for any film. Overall, the film earned $245 million worldwide. Hardly a box office failure. With marketing costs factored in, the film likely broke even in theaters, but with residual revenues including video rentals, video game and toy spin-offs, pay-per-view, and cable television licensing fees, there is no doubt that the film was ultimately profitable.

And yet, for the most part a myth persists that Ang Lee’s film was a box office failure. Many critics point to the original film’s second weekend “dropoff,” in which its box office receipts were 70% smaller over the following weekend as an indication of its financial failure. While this number is huge, remember that a 70% decline translates into a nearly $20 million dollar subsequent weekend, which isn’t horrible as far as popcorn movies are concerned. The “Incredible Hulk,” which is supposedly the superior and more successful film, dropped off over 61% in its second weekend, cashing in a little over $20 million in the box office, which is a comparable drop off to the original film.

7 REASONS WHY: “Hulk” is Better Than “The Incredible Hulk”

Beyond the box office numbers, HULK is actually a superior film to THE INCREDIBLE HULK for the following reasons:

1) Sam Elliott Makes William Hurt Look Like Private Pyle as General Ross. Having spent time one-on-one with both of these actors I can say without reservation that Sam Elliott is a much more convincing military man than William Hurt. I worked with Elliott on Mel Gibson’s “We Were Soldiers” and this guy seems to have soldiering in his DNA. He served in the military many years ago and has the strength, gruffness, and single-mindedness that makes him incredibly convincing whenever he dons a uniform onscreen. Hurt, on the other hand, doesn’t have a military bone in his body. I enjoyed spending time talking with Hurt on the set of “The Village” (he called me “The Captain,” as a nod to my former military rank), and I can honestly say that he is the furthest thing from a military man, which he exudes during his performance in the new film. There is an unmistakable softness to him that acting skill alone can’t transcend. Granted, he had a pretty weak script to work with, but he couldn’t shine the jump boots of Elliott’s General Ross.

2) The Hulk is a West Coast Character. In the comics, the Hulk spends a lot of time bouncing around the desert and America’s West Coast. The first film captured this essence masterfully as a true homage to the comics that inspired the film. In the new film, the Hulk finds his way to New York City, just to give the filmmakers an excuse to stage a boring battle with the Abomination on the streets of Manhattan, like just about every other disaster flick with a penchant for destroying the Big Apple.

3) Ang Lee Created a “Movie Comic.” One of the coolest things about the original Hulk was Ang Lee’s attempt to craft an onscreen comic book, using panels, split screens, and intersting transitions that honored the protagonist’s pulp past, while simulaneously enriching the film’s genre with new story-telling techniques that weren’t merely artifice.

4) Louis Leterrier is No Ang Lee. The fact that Marvel Studios contracted a B-movie hack to helm the picture indicates their unwillingness to allow healthy creativity and reinterpretation of the Hulk property. Leterrier’s resume includes the forgettable Transporter series as well as the Jet Li project, “Unleashed.” Clearly he’s a guy who knows how to stage fight and action sequences and little else. Undoubtedly Oscar-winning Ang Lee had too much brains, skill, and subtlety to film a comic book adaptation.

5) The Incredible Hulk Has No Overarching Theme. Theme is one of the most important aspects of filmic story telling. Theme answers the essential question of what the movie is about, or what it is trying to say beyond the mere plot.

For example, one could say one of the themes of Ang Lee’s picture was anger. How anger can destroy, create, protect, kill, enliven, confound, complicate, envigorate, and ultimately heal.

On a secondary level, Lee’s Hulk also explored an aspect of the timeless Oedipal struggle, of how the son is constantly in struggle against the father and how that struggle shapes men into who they are. To a lesser degree, this struggle was also played out between Sam Elliott’s General Ross and his wayward and lovelost daughter Betty (Jennifer Connelly), who had fallen for the Hulk’s alter ego (Bruce Banner) creating all sorts of complications.

In contrast, “The Incredible Hulk” is about nothing, as far as I can tell. Ed Norton’s Banner only wants to control and destroy the Hulk, while Eric Bana’s Banner was disgusted yet simultaneously intoxicated by his Hulk. Bana’s Banner admitted liking the feeling of power and the exorcism of anger that occurred when he transformed into the Hulk. In this way, his transformation into the Hulk was a metaphor for the anger and destructiveness we humans experience from time to time. Herein lies the brilliance of Lee’s film. Norton’s relationship with the Hulk was disconnected and pointed no where. He simply spent the bulk of the film hiding from his Hulk and simply used it as a tool at the end of the film, as it was the only force capable of contending with Tim Roth’s Abomination (of a performance).

6) Ed Norton’s Banner Can’t Hold Eric Bana’s Banner’s Testube. Try saying that 10 times fast.

Apparently a prerequisite to play the role of Bruce Banner is to have played a neo-Nazi in a previous independent film (Norton: American History X; Bana: Chopper). I wonder what’s in the late Bill Bixby’s past?

I’m one of the few peeps out there who thinks Mr. Norton is a tad overrated. That he has received additional kudos for helping to write this script under a pseudonym (Edward Harrison) goes to show the cinegeek bias towards this fella.  (NOTE: to Norton’s credit, he got into a bit of a row with Marvel concerning his take on the film, which you can read about here).  Bottom line, it felt as though Norton brought nothing to the table in this performance. Nothing hidden, nothing tying him in knots (other than the fact that he has an 8-foot green alter ego). Since the producers were adamant about discarding everything about the previous film, in essence creating a fresh “reboot,” we know nothing about his past or his backstory. And it is backstory that informs the actor when he is in the moment. Hence the pointlessness of Norton’s interpretation of the character.

Bana, on the hand, brought a tortured Bruce Banner to the screen. First of all, he had a psychopathic borderline sadist for a dad (Nick Nolte). This relationship exists beneath the surface of every one of Bana’s scenes. If he weren’t the Hulk, he would still barely be able to contain the rage he feels towards his wayward father. The fact that he is the Hulk is what makes this dilemma interesting.

7. Tim Roth: An Abominable Abomination. Tim Roth is a fine actor. A one-note actor, but a fine one nonetheless. But a crack Special Forces soldier? I think not. Now I know the producers of “The Incredible Hulk” weren’t so keen on nailing technical accuracy in terms of their portrayal of military men in the film, but casting a stubby unshaven British guy in the role of rough and tumble Special Forces officer defies our willing suspension of disbelief. Having met and worked with many Special Ops soldiers over my military career, several adjectives commonly come to mind to describe them: big, thick, mean, badass. Unfortunately none of those words could be used to describe little Mr. Roth. His alter ego - the Abomination - isn’t really worth discussing here, other than to say that his much-anticipated matchup with the Hulk is underwhelming to say the least.

Oh, by the way, if you’re looking for accurate onscreen representation of a Special Ops soldier, look no further than Black Hawk Down and check out a great performance by an actor we might have mentioned somewhere in this post…Eric Bana.

My interest is always piqued when another war film hits the theaters. As a cinemaphile, I’m concerned with seeing a well-conceived, researched, and executed story that creates a profound emotional response. As a former military man, I’m most concerned with “fidelity,” primarily in the portrayal of the military characters’ motivations, dialogue & lingo, and uniforms. From a technical perspective, I also like to see an accurate portrayal (or at least a valiant attempt of an accurate portrayal) of military hierarchy, customs, and operations.

I have some experience in the realm of technical accuracy in military films, serving as a military advisor for the film, “We Were Soldiers,” starring Mel Gibson. Oddly enough, my great-grandfather, with whom I share first and last names, was also a military advisor for several films in the 1950’s. Although neither of us obviously had any impact on the writing of the films we worked on, I can say with confidence that I feel good about doing my best to help create an accurate portrayal of the technical aspects of soldiering, including spending several weeks with the entire cast in a bootcamp environment, training them on the fundamentals of military weapons, tactics, jargon, and how to wear the uniform properly.

There has been a lot of talk in recent months about why recently released Iraq War films have failed to strike gold at the box office with American audiences. Here’s a look at the box office take from a recent slate of films (from the website www.cinematical.com):

In the Valley of Elah (2007) - $6.8 million.
Stop Loss (2008) - $10.6 million
Redacted (2007) - $.06 million.
Home of the Brave (2006) - $.04 million

The conventional wisdom is that we are overloaded with information about Iraq and would rather “escape” when we head to the theaters, rather than sit through a commentary on something that is happening in real time on the other side of the globe. One film critic, Betty Jo Tucker, put it this way:

Because information and/or visuals about the Iraq War and the War on Terror run almost 24/7 on television news, the internet and radio, we are less likely to pay money for a film about them.

To the first point, I couldn’t disagree more. Americans are fascinated with “reality.” The popularity and pervasiveness of Reality Television (another area in which I have professional experience) is a testament to this fact. (Although I will say that the word, “reality,” has taken on new meaning in recent years to imply a phenomenon - Reality TV - that resembles reality as a close facsimile, but actually bears few commonalities with the everyday waking experience we traditionally refer to as reality, but that’s another blog post entirely).

The other reason commonly offered to explain the lack of box office success of the recent Iraq films is that these films impart a negative portrayal of the war and American audiences would rather see a film that is inspiring or portrays American soldiers in a positive manner.

The second point has some legs but doesn’t tell the whole story as to why these films have been unsuccessful. Certainly, many of these films are telling a story that is not particularly sunny. The conflict itself isn’t a terribly happy affair, so I would argue that it would be nearly impossible to create light-hearted Iraq War films. But I don’t think Americans are looking for stories that are light-hearted and whimsical when it comes to this subject matter. In fact, understanding what are we are looking for when we go to the movies helps us understand why these films have been lackluster at the box office.

So what are we looking for at the movies, you ask? Primarily, it’s to be entertained. We call it the entertainment industry for a reason. In fact, I would argue that entertainment, in the form of movies, television, video games, the internet, and sports events, is one of our most important and valuable exports and one of the few things we continue to manufacture as a nation. Consider this: combining total entertainment revenues with advertising spending (a form of entertainment itself these days), Americans spent over ONE TRILLION DOLLARS on entertainment in 2007.

Let’s call a spade a spade: as a general rule, American filmmaking primarily serves as entertainment, not as art, and definitely not as political commentary. The artistry of film is a wonderful element in the presentation of the entertainment product, and certainly helps elevate entertaining fare into the realm artwork, but art is not the object of the vast majority of American film productions. And while very often social commentary is an intrinsic element of masterful American filmmaking, this element is not what initially brings people into theaters and inspires them to spread the word to others. Imagine this exchange taking place at the water cooler: “You’ve got to see this new movie Juno!” “Oh really, why?” “It really says a lot about the issues of reproductive rights, teenage pregnancy, and parenting!”

Instead, what we might actually hear is something like: “You have got to see Knocked Up, it’s freaking hilarious. I practically peed my pants!” That’s going to make me want to go see a movie. Later, when we’ve allowed the film to sink in, we might reflect on its nuances and its portrayal of the truths of becoming a parent for the first time that allow a film like this to transcend the comedy genre and enter into the realm of masterful America cinema. (Yeah, I said it. Masterful). This film works because it delivers the goods. It’s a comedy and it’s funny. Very simple. But this film exceeds just “working” and became a blockbuster because it not only delivered on the implied promise of the filmgoing experience - to entertain - but it also used that primary function of entertainment to open our minds to ideas that were identifiable in our own personal lives. It is this connection to the audience through our own personal identification, that is impossible without fidelity, without inherent truth, that makes a film great.

The lack of fidelity - which I referred to as “truth” in my review of the disappointing, “The Kingdom,” (which for some odd reason incorrectly gets lumped together with Iraq War films), combined with an absence of real entertainmnet value is the main culprit in the failures of recent Iraq War films to attract audiences. In short, Iraq movies haven’t succeeded financially because audiences aren’t interested in the overall subject matter; Iraq movies haven’t succeeded because they are simply bad movies, or at best, deeply flawed movies, or in the case of “In the Valley Elah,” arthouse fare that no one expected to take in $100 million at the box office.

“Redacted” is gimmicky, spiteful, and contains comically poor acting. Throw in an incredibly depressing subject matter - the rape of a young Iraqi girl by American soldiers - and you have a recipe for failure. The hack Brian De Palma’s “Casualties of War” was equally God-awful. “The Home of the Brave” is just plain bad - a soap opera-ish and melodramatic foray into the War genre with disastrous results.

I would like to spend a moment on the MTV Films recent release, “Stop Loss,” about an Iraq War vet who falls victim to the Army’s actual policy of “stop-lossing” soldiers in order to remedy their manpower shortages, whereby soldiers are forced to continue military service, even after they have honorably served their initial enlistment. I had a personal interest in this film because I myself was involuntarily recalled to serve in Iraq (illegally, it turned out) through a different “backdoor draft” program involving the Army’s Inactive Ready Reserve. But that’s a story for another time.

Getting back to the film, “Stop Loss,” the beginning of the film, in which we experience a sequence featuring Ryan Phillipe’s squad of soldiers on an operation in Iraq is promising, in that it is tense, exciting, scary, and ultimately entertaining. When the men return home, scarred physically and emotionally, the film takes on even greater tension when Phillipe’s character is informed that he won’t be getting out like he had planned. Instead, he’s been “stop-lossed,” and reassigned back into another unit that is returning to combat in Iraq. Believing this to be wrong and a violation of his enlistment contract, he makes a split-second decision to go on the run, ostensibly to seek help from his Senator in Washington, DC. Inexplicably, the girlfriend of his best friend and fellow soldier (wonderfully played by Chatum Tanning), decides to go on the lam with him, creating all sorts of tension between the two men when word gets back to the unit. The film then becomes a “road movie,” with several pitstops along the way in which Phillipe meets with the family of a soldier who died on his watch, runs into another soldier on the run, and reunites with an injured vet recovering from multiple amputations at an Army hospital somewhere.

The refrain we hear over an over again from Phillipe’s mouth is that this policy is wrong, that he served honorably while he was in, and that as a matter of principle, he can no longer serve. His options are few - either turn himself in and be subject to possible punishment for going AWOL, stay on the run, or utilize the services of a New York lawyer to emigrate to Canada - for good.

***SPOILER WARNING***: Besides degrading the film’s integrity through some pretty ridiculous time lapses, plot holes, and Herculean logistical feats (driving from New York City to Texas in what seems like a blink of an eye), director Kimbery Peirce degrades the integrity of her main character’s intentions by causing him to make decisions that contradict everything he has stood for throughout the movie. After spending the entire film lambasting the Army’s stop-loss policy and nearly sacrificing everything - his family, his reputation, his citizenship, his best friend - he decides in the last instant to abandon that line of thinking and return to duty in the final scene of the film, jumping on the bus with his band of brothers to head back off to Iraq. Why did we subject ourselves to his excellent adventure and his pontifications upon the flaws of our country’s war policies? We may not have agreed with Phillipe’s character, but at least he stood up for something. His last minute change of heart undermines the “fidelity” that the filmmaker worked so hard to create over the previous two hours. Perhaps he ultimately decides to stand up for his buddies and return to go fight with them, instead of standing up for his own view of right and wrong. Perhaps he abandons the desires of the self for the desires of the “greater good,” i.e. the safety and welfare of his men. Perhaps. And that’s an interesting dilemma for sure. But when you spend the whole movie arguing for the other side of the coin and then turn 180 degrees in the closing seconds of the film, the effect is to try to have it both ways and ultimately stand up for nothing. The filmmaker didn’t have the courage to allow her character to follow through on his convictions.

***END SPOILER ALERT***: The key to understanding the box office failure of this film is to realize that standing up for something and then failing to follow through on that conviction until the bitter end is inherently not entertaining. We are inspired by the courage of others, even when that courage involves doing something that might be unpopular. In the case of “Stop Loss,” the film is already at a disadvantage because although the Iraq War is incredibly unpopular, we as film going audiences still want to be entertained and lifted up. If an Iraq War film is to be financially successful, it needs to find a way to be entertaining to the core and ultimately inspiring. Take Oscar-winning film, “Platoon,” for example. It’s about an extremely unpopular war, it portrays the film in a predominately negative light, but at the end, even though Willem Dafoe’s Elias is ostensibly murdered by Tom Berenger’s Barnes in the closing moments, all the while Charlie Sheens’ Chris Taylor’s innocence is forever lost - we are ulimately inspired and moved by Elias’ final sacrifice. He didn’t have to do it and it was an arguably futile death, but he fulfilled his charactor’s destiny and fidelity by remaining noble until the bitter end.

It’s a shame “Stop Loss” isn’t good because it does raise important social and political issues. Channing Tatum is excellent in the film and Ryan Phillipe, despite the limitations of the script, did as best he could with the material provided. Despite the failures of the storyline, the director Kimberly Peirce did a decent job of accurately capturing the essence of being a young soldier, as the men in “Stop Loss,” were clearly taught, in the immortal words of “Stripes” Sgt. Hulka: “to eat, sleep, walk, talk, shoot, shit like a United States soldier.”

Here’s a review for the film, THE KINGDOM, currently available on DVD…

The skinny: The Monkey in My Mind says 5.5 (out of ten).

I am a fan of geopolitical thrillers and was pretty pumped to see this film when the trailer started showing up in theaters like a year ago. It took me a while to find the time to break away from the wife and baby to meet up with my brother-in-law to catch the flick late one night on my way home from a business trip to NY. By this time, I had already read a few reviews on www.rottentomatoes.com, and had an inkling that the film would be underwhelming. It was one of those situations in which my Monkey Mind was determined to see this thing, regardless of what the world thought of it, so I pressed on and made the rendezvous with Leland (my bro-in-law) and strapped into my seat, prepared to be entertained, if not blown away.

For me, the impact of the film was summed up on my way out of the theater when I asked Leland, “On a scale of 1 to 10, what did you think?” He replied, “About a nine.” To which I said, “Okay, taking out all of the guns and violence at the end, what did you think?” Scratching his head a moment as we scooted out the double doors about a half hour after midnight, he adjusted his rating to about a 6, which matches up nicely with the Monkey’s take on it (5.5).

The bottom line is, if you’ve seen HEAT, you’ve seen a better expression of, if not the exact plot, the execution of a strongly crafted violence-extravaganza thriller. The films are totally different in theme and plot (obviously), but both films at least attempt to satisfy a similiar desire within the hearts of its mostly male audience. We men like to see movies about bad-ass dudes wreaking havoc with other bad-ass dudes trying to stop them, bottom line. The genius of HEAT is how its characters’ bad-assness is expressed. In other words, when Val Kilmer and Bobby D and Tom Sizemore and Al Palcino are running around the streets of LA conducting one of the most realistic and gripping shoot-em-up sequences in the history of film, one of the reasons we are so gripped by this scene appears to be its gritty realism (which, incidentally was choreographed by a former British SAS soldier). But in actuality, what simply appears to be action & violence, this gritty realism, is compounded by Truth (with a capital T, no less). In other words, the writer (Michael Mann) has created a world so rich and characters so genuine, that the gritty realism is elevated to the level of Truth through the actions and choices of his characters. We are so moved by this action and violence not simply because it was researched, choreographed, and executed with extreme precision, intention, and attention to detail. We are moved by this spectacle because we CARE about the people conducting the gunplay. And I don’t mean “care” in an ASPCA or nursing home kind of way, I mean care in the sense of the natural human tendancy to empathize with fellow humans. The problem with a lot of films is that the people we see up on the screen often don’t fall into the category of “fellow humans.” They’re just beautiful people reciting lines and running around.

Anyway, getting back to The Kingdom. You just don’t really care about this elite team of FBI agents who basically weasel their way into Saudi Arabia to investigate a horrific terrorist attack on an American housing complex there. And let me break them down for you.

Jamie Foxx plays the leader of the team. We are supposed to care about him because in the opening scene of the film, we meet him during “Take Your FBI Agent Dad to School Day,” where he tells his son’s kindergarten class (led by a super-hot kindergarten teacher played by Minka Kelly - why couldn’t she just be normal looking) that his boy being born was the best day of his life. I guess this is supposed to be the obligatory “Save the Cat” scene (read the screenwriting book, Save the Cat, for more info on this), in which we’re supposed to care about this guy because he loves his son. There’s not much else in terms of character development with this guy, other than the fact that he has a habit of befriending the sons of dudes killed in the line of duty.

Chris Cooper plays the wiley, stodgy vet who’s seen it all. He has some decent lines and is such a great actor that one can be mystified by his performance and fail to see the one-dimension-ness of his character.

Jennifer Garner is so forgettable in this movie, besides her perky you-know-whats in those tight government t-shirts. Here’s an example of the lack of Truth in this film. I don’t know if any of you have ever been to the middle east, but it’s freaking “hot as” over there. My dad was stationed in the embassy in Cairo and I can tell you from experience, if you’re going to spend a considerable amount of time outside in the blazing sun, you don’t wear a t-shirt unless you want a farmer’s tan from hell. So there’s Jenny, bouncing around in one of the most strict Muslim countries in the world, where even Western women are obliged to cover up, wearing one of the tightest t-shirts that Costumer Susan Matheson could find. Not only would this simply be a complete no-go in terms of respecting the local Wahabbi law, but she would also be suffering from a horrendous sunburn after standing around the huge Oklahoma City-esque bomb crater, which is the main crime scene that the FBI agents have to contend with. No Truth here. Might sound trivial, but in a film there are many opportunities to express Truth and we have to take every opportunity when we get them.

Since he’s all the rage these days, I guess I have to mention that Jeremy Piven makes a cameo here as a coked-up diplomat handler type who comes on the scene to shoo away Foxx’s team of investigators. His performance is forgettable, mostly because it’s Jeremy being Ari again, but also because it lacks Truth. Embassy types aren’t reckless fast-talking wise guys the characterization here doesn’t elevate to Character, and instead slogs around in the realm of caricature. That being said, the only thing my eyes were really drawn to whenever Ari was onscreen was how short Jeremy and Jamie look when they’re standing next to each other.

Finally, Jason Bateman plays the wise-cracking cynic. I don’t know why Hollywood persists in doing this, but there really aren’t that many cynics in government service. And if a true cynic like the Bateman character did find his way into the FBI, he would promptly try to find his way out of the FBI as soon as he realized that he was all alone in an environment that doesn’t really support critical thinking. These kind of characters are simply Hollywood comic relief, but they are antithetical and truly fictional. Don’t get me wrong, there are many, many funny people in the military (and I assume the FBI) - you actually have to have some kind of sick sense of humor to do the job with a straight face - but there are very few whiney, wimpy types like Bateman’s character. The field just doesn’t attract those types.

I want to wrap up soon, but I have to say a little bit about director Peter Berg’s style in this film. Now I liked Friday Night Lights, the movie, which I believe was his first film, but there are scenes in this movie that felt like they were occuring in the same “If Life Were A Movie Universe” as his previous film. This came up for me in a few interstitial moments where we see the Saudi police character go home to his family, shot warmly and handheld, and set to this same Americana-type music we heard in Lights. I’m sorry, it just feels weird to see this guy go home to his Muslim family as if he’s in the middle of West Texas gearing up for the State Championship. I think Berg was trying to go for the commonality of all of us, that this guy is a family man just like I am, but it lacked Truth in its execution. It felt contrived and sentimental. This also popped up when Jamie Foxx went door to door on the housing complex interviewing witnesses. The characters he met up with were like Perriman football fans transported across the globe and dropped in the middle of Saudi Arabia, ma and paw, sittin’ on the porch, watching the world go by. Very few oil field contracters bring their families along, and that those that do, I’m sorry to offend, usually seem a little more educated and worldly than the townfolk we meet in this film. I’ve know a few embassy types and oil company types in my day and they look, act, and talk nothing like the local yokels presented in the film.

Notice I didn’t talk much about plot. It’s almost a worthless endeavor to even bring it up, as there is so much lack of “truthiness” to even begin that type of critical look at the film.

On a boring Friday night, I suppose this film would be a decent rental, but not at the expense of engaging in real experiences with the real people in your life.