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Do not waste your time searching for similarities between this hack script and the excellent Earthsea Trilogy (now 6 books...) by Ursula Le Guin. The scriptwriters have taken a beautifully formed creature, stripped it of all its flesh, and broken the skeleton into small pieces. They have then selected a few small shards of bone from the original, around which they have woven a thin tissue of totally new skin to cover their abomination.

We all know it is virtually impossible to condense a rich book satisfactorily into a film or TV format, but Lieberman and Scott have paid scant heed to Le Guin's original. Not even the characters' names have been respected and the roles they play are largely fresh fabrications.

Some poor adaptations can be justified insofar as they are, in themselves, worth watching. I am afraid this is not even true of this series. It is entirely derivative (but not, unfortunately, from the books from which it has taken its title).

The underlying theme to this film offered the opportunity for a taut, intelligent, and well thought-out appreciation of the activities of SWAT.

Instead, what we are served is typical Hollywood "Let's-take-a-premise-and-make-it-as-unrealistic-as-possible" hogwash. The movie was boringly predictable from the outset and the excellent cast failed totally to make up for the ridiculous story-line.

My recommendation? Take your money to see a different film; don't waste it on this one.

At last, this little gem of a film is available on DVD (only in French, no subtitles, but it is, in any case, a difficult film to enjoy other than in French), together with 2 hours of additional interviews.

This film is a wicked little satire on the differences (and, below the surface, the similarities) between the bourgeois LeQuesnoy family and the wastrel Groseille family. The artifice used is the switching of two children at birth by the unhappy mistress of the gynaecologist.

For many of the actors and the director, this was their first film, providing a stepping stone for greater things. But "La Vie est un Long Fleuve Tranquille" should not be missed. Many of its little jokes became catchphrases in the France of the eighties and early nineties, so cruelly apt were they.

And do not miss Etienne Chatiliez's later films, particularly "Tatie Danielle" et "Le Bonheur est dans le Pre".

You might not enjoy this film - some people clearly haven't. But I recommend you make the effort to decide for yourself. It will be worth it.