Review of The Good Shepherd (2006) by Hollyc — 29 Dec 2006

Well, sort of a mess, sort of not. The Good Shepherd is beautifully shot and well acted with plenty of intrigue. However, it just needed better direction (in post production) and/or editing at putting it all together.

I'm sure there is a great movie in there someplace, but I don't think De Niro quite has the chops yet to put the whole story together as well as it needed to be given the material. There's plenty of places in the film that were magnificent, but there's also an abundance of "meh"s and "wtf?" Matt Damon is really wonderful given how subtle a character he plays.

I walked away really struck by how good he was (oscar-worthy even). Jolie, though touted as a main role in the film--isn't really---which was kind of a disappointment (heh). All the supporting actors were outstanding though (Turturro, Crudup, Baldwin--Timothy Hutton, De Niro and Pesci) It is a very long film, though I must admit, I never looked at my watch, but I did certainly leave a little frustrated at seeing how close this movie was to being a classic, yet falling short.

But it's a worthy DVD rental, and a must-see for any CIA buffs, that's for sure.