Older director Martin Donovan reveals in his commentary that this was a film from his anxious and naive,nervous days.He looks back honestly at what is definitely wrong with this film.The fact that a young Colin Firth is tremendously brilliant in his acting is enough for me to go back to this bomb!

Sometimes when a Polish director and Italian Producer get funds from France and actors from America and Czechoslovakia to make a period piece about Russia.....this is what results!

This film runs the gamut of opinions from miscasting to misdirection to inappropriate soundtrack to you name it.This is one of the truly debated films of recent years.It was booed off the stage at Cannes.This film is undeniably eye-catching and different and I keep coming back to it.

Have you ever found yourself laughing at American icon,Harrison Ford,trying to be Russian?He is deplorable,but the nature of this story always sucks me in, though Ford wouldn't know a bowl of borscht if he drowned in it!

Famed author Robert Louis Stevenson wrote a witty comic novel about people during the Napoleonic Wars.An irresistible cast of English greats plod there way through this piece of sludge lifelessly with an ill-conceived screenplay and static direction.I fill in all of the numerous gaps every time I watch it!

Lothaire Blutheau is a wonderful French Canadian actor whose lack of English knowledge makes this always make me wince.The director makes us sit through countless scenes of trudging through snowy wilderness with little to no dialogue.The soundtrack a;ways helps me to get through this film that is so uneven and ill-conceived, and yet....

This film contains two of my all time favorite actors,Ioan Gruffudd and Rachel Griffiths. Wales looks great!!!!!

Could any actress more inept than a young Patricia Arquette be chosen to play an American doctor in Civil War torn Burma???? Films on the Burmese struggle are rare to none.That's why I don't donate this one to Goodwill!!!John Boorman is not a favorite director of mine!

This is my #1 most hated film of all time, and yet I have seen it three times and own two copies.The Academy loved it and so did 50% of the world.I am in the other 50%(along with Elaine fron SEINFELD)...and of that 50% I am in that 1% who will keep watching it to try to figure out the mystique of this long movie with excellent actors that eludes me every time I see it!

If ever a film hinged on the performance of a single actor it would be this one.Philip Seymour is undeniably Truman Capote,but this film does not have any of the panache of Doug McGrath's later release INFAMOUS on the exact same subject.Hoffman is the only reason I return to this film to see a true artist work his craft.

I have never cared for Billy Bob Thornton as an actor.I find him hard to look at,and his much publicized personal exploits have made stop watching his later work.This film is so unpleasant, yet there is something about Thornton's "hmmm...hmmmn" that still creeps me out!

One of the most eye appealing films ever produced with a soundtrack to match.The attention to detail is uncanny,and the acting is outstanding from Robert Downey,Jr as Sir Robert Merivel.The problem? The adaptation of the novel is incredibly clunky and disjointed.Knowing the book helps!