Silver City

Year: 2004

Grade: C-

Country: USA

Director: Sayles

Review

i need to see “return of the secaucus seven” before i make my definitive decision, but as it stands right now i can’t say that i’m all that impressed with john sayles. lone star was good, but not amazing, eight men out was okay, and this film was also just okay. his work is consistently long-winded and geared towards large casts with intertwined stories, but they’re never as good as “short cuts” or “magnolia.” he generally manages to get good performances and has some pretty interesting ideas buried in his films, but those ideas have a tough time being seen because of his storytelling style. this film wasn’t at all what the previews indicated – a thinly veiled fictional story of a bush-esque governor (cooper) who is under the thumb of a major mining corporation called bentel (like bechtel) which is run by kris kristofferson’s character. it turns out to be another story about a man trying to discover the story behind a dead body and finding love in the process (pretty much the same plot as lone star). i heard that stephen king’s latest book is about a car with psychic powers. he said he’s going to stop writing pretty soon out of fear that he’ll stop being original…maybe he and sayles should talk. all that aside, this film is relatively uninteresting. the mystery aspect of the film wears thin pretty quickly, the ending was overly predictable, there’s some lazy/convenient storytelling, and it just didn’t grab me. the performances were mostly adequate (cooper’s was the best). probably not worth your time.

Watched in theater