Ralph's Movie Reviews: FAIR GAME

Thursday, November 11, 2010

FAIR GAME

Political drama
Based on a true story

PRINCIPAL CAST MEMBERS
Naomi Watts: high-ranking “non-official covert operative” C.I.A. agent Valerie Plame
Sean Penn: her husband former ambassador Joseph Wilson
Liraz Charhi: Zahraa, a physican
Khaled Nabawy: her brother Hammad
Michael Kelly: Valerie's immediate supervisor Jack
David Andrews: Irve Lewis "Scooter" Libby, aide to Vice-President Dick Cheney
Adam LeFevre: White House Senior Advisor and Deputy Chief of Staff Karl Rove
Sam Shepard: Valerie's career military dad Sam

REVIEW
We all know “you can’t fight city hall”. How about fighting the administration of the most powerful political body in the entire world, the United States government? In a word: you ain’t got a hope in heck!

Back in 2003 there was some dispute whether Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction or not. Anyone suggesting that the White House misled the public in its justification for going to war would have to be dealt with in the most effective manner.

With great attention to detail (except for one teeny miscue noted below) it all rings true. Both Naomi Watts and Sean Penn are outstanding but this has to be one of Penn’s very best performances ever.

CLASSIFICATION

for some language.

FOR NITPICKERS ONLY
This is one of my classic all-time favourite nitpicks: at the end of the telephone conversation Joe hangs up and Valerie is left listening to the dial tone. In reality the dial tone is only heard after picking up the phone before dialling. That’s why it’s called a dial tone.

P.S.
I have yet to figure out how the first scene relates to the rest of the movie.

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my ratings system

I've always thought that telling too much about a movie or warning someone about a "twist" at the end deprives the person the pleasure of seeing it as it unfolds, so I don’t do it. You may not always agree with my rating of course, but at least it is an unbiased opinion unlike some of the full time professional reviewers who are on the studio’s payroll.

A few movies you won’t see any review from me:

Scary movies: I’m the world’s biggest chicken and just hate getting the crap scared out of me. I can handle an unexpected door slam, that kind of thing, but a movie that keeps you on the edge of your seat…not for me. Sorry.
Movies geared to the young teen and pre-teen crowd with dialog comprising mostly of crude remarks, awful jokes and lots of rude, socially unacceptable body noises. "The Spy that Shagged Me" comes to mind. (I wonder if the kids know what the British verb to shag someone really means? They probably do; I bet you it’s the parents who haven’t a clue).
Sometimes Hollywood gets on a roll and they produce a series of movies that are all very much alike. For example movies about the CIA were very popular and so we had The Bourne Identity and Bad Company and The Sum of All Fears. They all had the same basic theme and it becomes repetitive. I will see some, but not all of them.

FYI this is my rating system:

0 stars = Terrible: so bad it’s not worth talking about; in fact, I’d pay you not to go
= Lousy: I actually got up and walked out before the end it was just that bad (no kidding)
= Not so good: thought about walking out but hung in just in case it got better (but it didn’t)
= A so-so good movie: I enjoyed it somewhat but wasn’t all that crazy about it
= A really good movie: I recommend seeing it
= An excellent movie you just got to see! I suggest you put it on your "To Do List" it’s that good.

some favourite websites

For those into it, Nitpickers at

has more movie mistakes than you could ever imagine. My contributions can be seen if you check out the Nitpickers Registry and click on the link Nitpickers Listed by Nitpicker Number, select the group 45,401 - 45,500 and drill down to number 45411. Although I have 56 nitpicks to my credit, some have almost 2,000. You wonder sometimes where they find the time to do it.