1. Russel Crowe's accent is hilarious. In the only three moments when he rises above a low registered growl his tone varies between an American and his native Australian and sounds quite disorienting.
The film follows the usual pattern of a modern day thriller. Two storylines; one man murdered and another put into a coma over a shady drug deal, and a woman caught up in an affair with congressman Stephen Collins (Ben Affleck in one of the films more substantial roles) who commits suicide and brings the illicit relationship out into the open.
Reporter Cal McAffrey (Russel Crowe) begins to look into the murder case whilst also consoling Collins as he was a college friend. Whilst going over evidence from the homicide case, he comes across a piece of evidence that links the two stories up. I'll let M. Night Shyamalan take it from here.
The film adds little to the ever expanding Political Thriller genre. Most of the characters are incredibly typecast and feel dated and the script isn't anything new and for it's two hours and a bit timeframe it drags on a fair bit towards the end. I must say though, whilst watching the film, I felt it had a distinctly crime show feel to it with the editing with it's scenes book ended with quick shots of cars, skyscrapers, birds, newspaper stands etc. In the credits, apart from the cliched Creedence track, I notice the film was based upon a BBC television show. I would have honestly preferred to see the film as a serial rather than a film. At points it seems to cram too much into the time slot which makes you kind of drift off and find it harder to follow towards the end.
Overall, it was just another average political thriller which should keep the middle aged men entertained and stop them from complaining about whatever they do.
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