2thomjef

foul and unnecessary language did this film in for full family viewing. I wonder why such a wonderful and entertaining film featuring Tom Hanks felt it had to scoop so low with the typical 4 letters words which did not add anything (as if these words ever do)for a pretty good film. The story itself is very consistent with the characters sleepy little town on the mississippi river who have a very clever scheme of robbing the local gambling boat of at least 1.6 million dollars ... George Wallace (black comic not the ex governor of Alabama) did a real good job as the county sheriff as well as I have ever seen him before. See this film and judge for yourself whether having less foul language would had made any impact on the effectiveness of this movie or not.

while visiting Key West several years ago We also toured Ernest Hemingway home where he lived back in the early 30's with his second wife Pauline. Under the "carriage house" where he did so many of his famous books such as "a farewell to arms" there is his book//gift shop. I brought his book "after the storm" and the guide told us that the story behind the story is what brought Hemingway to Key West in the first place. Seems local legend had it that a Spanish schooner when down during a storm and Hemingway's friend Don Pasos explored it and actually saw thru a porthole bodies floating around and yes, a beautiful woman as well wearing jewelry etc ... , which gave Hemingway the idea to write this novel. As far as the movie goes it does follow the central story but with a few twists thrown in for good measure. The locations of the movie are beautiful but it was not taken in Bahamans as it depicted but Belize. I just wished the movie was longer as there were some side issues that could had been developed a little more ... like how did Malcolm know Stephen Lang for instance or the "real" role of Jill Jacobson ( the governor's wife ) to Arno and Jean-Pierre ? ... Benjamin Bratt was really good wasn't he as Arno? .. he has truly matured since his days as "Lenny's" prop in the TV series "Law & Order" and has become a good actor and I cannot think of anyone but him playing the role of Arno .... good movie ... based upon a very good book ... and filmed in a very pretty setting ... what more could one asked when watching a movie ?

this is a very good and seemly very realistic movie of how it felt to be in the front lines of the last few months of WWII. I was impressed with the excellent acting as well as I felt I could feel what they were feeling. I was especially surprised with the acting ability of Dwight Yoakum who is a great country singer and song writer in his own right but never did I guess he could act as well as he did in this movie. .. .. I looked up to see whether he was in other movies and sure enough he is also in "sling blade" as well. I am not saying he steals the movie but he certainly adds to it as a very serious leader often seem as pushing his men to do more in order to save lives ... and did received the respect of his soldiers as well....