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A fictionalized account of Congressman Charlie Wilson's push to have the US support the Afghani fighters against the Soviet invasion. It was a great balance between comedy and drama, reminding me how disappointing it is that we all don't have script writers in real life. Ignoring all the witty lines, it also does a great job at showing how Congress really works, for both good and bad, as influence is peddled and favors are traded behind the scenes.

As for the clueless review that mentions "even if it does flunk the obvious link between the help that Herring and Wilson provide and the ultimate consequences (9/11)," it didn't ignore it at all. The end point about us spending billions to free Afghanistan but being unwilling to spend a million to rebuild the schools was a clear hat tip to that. It wasn't the war that led to 9/11, it was the usual ability of Congress to ignore long term impacts. If it had spent a small fraction on rebuilding Afghanistan that it did to free it, the Taliban would have never come to power.

I finally rented it. As the other commenter mentioned, it was received very well here in Israel. That just says how flat our industry is. Anything not terrible is great.

The movie was very predictable, had too many characters, and just didn't say anything new. The characters seemed taken out of a catalog of stereotypes.

I'll admit, I skipped about 30 minutes in the middle (gotta love DVDs!) just because it looked so predictable. Sure enough, as I continued the movie, everything seemed as expected.

It's not that it's bad, it's just that it's very average, and not deserving of the raves it received here.

I'll start with the minor nits. No flight attendant would survive being that annoying and intrusive on a flight. More importantly, no real southerner would equate Lincoln and Van Zant. He'd either have Lincoln much higher or much lower than Skynard, depending on the person's view on "The Late Unpleasantness." Finally, the child was a completely cliché movie child.

The movie was too slow for that empty a script and concept to keep my attention. As for the other review that said if your dad died, you'd ramble, my dad died when I was 28. Yes, I rambled, but the stuff the "hero" went through was just idiotic. However, not as idiotic and trite as the wedding subplot.

Even the great soundtrack couldn't give the movie enough emotion and life. It was a movie with a simple message, told without originality, that just couldn't survive the extremely long cut or the bland script. I enjoy so many of the actors, just not in this movie.

I love all the actors, which is why I rented the movie. I expected a character study, given who's in the ensemble, but I had hoped for an interesting one. Sadly, it's another example of New Yorkers thinking they're the center of the universe and anything about them must be wonderful.

Sadly, the characters were paint-by-number and the plots trite (when they existed) and the endings completely predictable. If the idea was that these were "typical stories", for a guy who grew up in Texas, lived many years in California and now lives overseas, the movie, it just reinforced how shallow and foolish movie makers in NY are and how badly they view their own fellow citizens.

He's been playing the same character for a while now. Admittedly, he does a better and low-key job in this than The Big Leibowski, but he seems to be coasting the last few years. A bunch of very good actors playing in a small movie makes this an above average movie, but not by much.

It's another bunch of middle-aged losers trying for their moment of glory. This time, it's a group of bar flies (which the name of their softball team recognizes) who get together and try to produce their own amateur porn movie. All the typical comedy situations you'd expect occur. Much of the humor is provided by Bridges' characters voice over, especially some admitting to obvious foreshadowing.

As mentioned, it's very predictable, with no real surprises but is saved by most of the supporting actors playing it very naturally. The only ones who go overboard are Bridges and Danson but not by much. Overall it's a nice movie to rent for some laughs

Macy, Ullman and Sutherland were as great as usual. Ritter wasn't bad either. What's her name was as pretty as usual. It could have been a good movie. To bad the plot was atrocious. It was completely predictable, trite and boring.

From the first 15 minutes, the rest of the movie was laid out like a child's paint by numbers routine. The characters were stock pieces of cut out cardboard. There was nothing new or interesting to say and that completely outweighed the acting, which was a pity.

Finally, too bad the script writer wasn't the victim. Especially with the "precocious" lines from the child, which were completely unbelievable.

Again, it's only the acting that prevented a much lower score.

It's an attempt at a slow paced dramady about one man's life in what he thinks is the shadow of his father. He's separated/divorced from his wife and not paying enough attention to his children. What seems to be an attempt to make the situation surreal just makes the characters seem cardboard. Problems are developed as if they're paint-by-numbers and resolved the same way.

Even Michael Cain, someone I love to watch, is sub-par here. I blame it on the material.

A slow paced movie must have enough to think about to keep interest. This almost does, but not quite. It's not a bad movie, it's just not a good one. It has a few good ideas, scenes and lines, but not enough to hold interest.