jeremy-340

A classic tale of the little people vs the big 'uns. It is set in a community that could be anywhere in rural North America under threat of suburbanization, but happens to be Ontario. This could matter from a box office point of view since it is sufficiently recognizable to Americans as to not need to be seen as a Canadian film.

The soulful, moody score from guitarist Bill Frisell helps carry the film forward as the down-on-their luck band of battlers try to fight the rising tide as represented by the billionaire's dastardly son. Sonny Stanton is played so interestingly by Noam Jenkins that you end of sort of liking him anyway. My favorite scene focuses on him getting into deeper trouble losing tons of money at the track.

Lisa Ray and Rachael Leigh Cook fight for most delicious horse country babe. Ernie Hudson, Keith Carradine, David Alpay, and Joel Keller, among others, give character performances that provide a fun weft to the scheming warp of counter-scam mastermind played by an understated-but-credible Luke Kirby.

Proof that Canadian film can be fun, I greatly enjoyed this film!

This is a great movie, with lots to appeal to a lot of different kinds of people. There is a continuous thread of humor that is very engaging, and a very cleverly-built suspense around how far things might go. There is a creative tension around the bizarre love triangle between the three main actors. The clashes between current ways of thinking and living and the vestiges of those of a generation ago is presented with love and plain good fun. A lot of original material and situations - you just don't see that much these days.

Canadian cinema is often criticized as being slow, boring, and too introspective. This film is guilty of none of those and will likely find success in all markets.

I actually looked up this movie on the IMDb to check if it was supposed to be a parody film (like Scary Movie) and I was the one guy who didn't know. So here I am now writing a review because I just can't believe the ratio between known quality talent (Cate Blanchett, Hilary Swank, Keanu Reeves, Giovanni Ribisi, Greg Kinnear, Katie Holmes - for goodness sake think of the movies that could have been made with this line-up!) and end product. You folks should start a new "Blockbuster vs Bomb" index of Resulting film divided by Known talent - this film would be darn close to the worst possible 1/10 score - a true Bomb.

Nearly every cheap film-making cliché is used to manipulate the viewer - discordant violins at the "crucial moment", gross-out make-up and blood splodges, "scary" wind and lighting effects in the Bayou trees, sudden appearances on-camera, etc. Name 'em, they're in there. Then there are the paint-by-numbers characters that are used to fill in the blanks, such as various sheriffs, etc.

It is true that Keanu Reeves is convincing as the wife-beating redneck - a good performance. Cate Blanchett was presumably under Director's orders to project all kinds of strong emotions, which she does. And like many actors before him, Giovanni Ribisi puts on a compelling show as the unpredictable mentally ill guy. When you roll in sweet girl Katie Holmes as the village slut and tidy Brit Cate playing the Bayou welfare single mom, it leads me to guess that the reason for making the movie was to give all these people an opportunity to play a contrasting role with their historical castings.

I am seriously going to ask for my rental money back when I return it to the video store, something I have never done before. I have previously watched equally bad movies but never before have I seen such a waste of talent and, ultimately, money. This industry apparently has trouble making profits - are people still asking why?