text: i had gone to the movies expecting to see a great film based on all the word of mouth and terrific reviews. the minute the opening sequence started i knew i was in trouble. the music and credits were trying so hard to evoke emotion i wanted to puke. all i got from this film was clichéd characters, contrived dialog and an unemotional script. director/writer Paul haggis' has managed to get great reviews with his manipulative, self righteous writing, but it doesn't fool me. some performance were good. don Cheadle is always good. i think Terrance Howard is slightly over rated but he was decent. ludicrous was way too on the nose. he should stick to rapping. Brendan Fraser was fine. Jennifer Esposito left no impression what so ever. i find nothing interesting about her. Sandra bullock is always the same in every movie, she's just okay. Matt Dillon was very good and i enjoyed watching him work. Ryan Philippe was good as well. but as far as the script and the lousy directing- this is actually one of those movies that is so annoyingly bad i actually took the time to write about it. i would not recommend this film to anyone, what a waste of time.