Fucking Sahara

April 17, 2005

You know why Matthew McConaughey looks so smug? Because he stole my fucking $10. Sometimes you get a little too bored and you end up at shit like this, even though you should know better.

Sahara, apparently based on some franchise adventures by Clive Cussler, has got to be the single most boring action adventure I’ve ever seen. Maybe I had a little too much to drink before hand, but I was nodding off repeatedly since there’s no actual “adventure” until maybe an hour into the movie.

There’s a reasonably workable plot about treasure hunter Dirk Pitt obsessively trying to find an abandoned Civil War ironclad in the middle of Africa, transported there by some sort of biblical flood (!), but there’s no humor or fun to be had anywhere. It’s not bad enough to mock heartily like Tomb Raider, or tightly woven enough to generate any sort of rush like National Treasure. I saw that Roger Ebert gave this three stars, which has to be one of those deals where he gives two stars based on the lead actress being hot.

By the way, just to ruin the movie for everyone, they find the ironclad. It is just below the surface of a sand dune, so all they needed to find it was a really big metal detector.

EDIT TO ADD: Remarkably bad usage of music in the film. The soundtrack was straight Freedom Rock, including “Sweet Home Alabama,” “Magic Carpet Ride,” and “We’re an American Band.” I think I heard some Marshall Tucker Band and some Canned Heat as well. The only connection I could make was that McConaughey is a Texas stoner so DIRK PITT must have been as well.

Posted in Moving Pictures