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So this is one of those movies that when it first came out, I was all “hey, that looks pretty good. I want to see that.”

I mean come on. Check out the cast: Dennis Quaid, Forest Whitaker, Mathew Fox, Sigourney Weaver, William Hurt. Or as I know them: That guy from The Rookie, Jefferson from Fast Times, the Doc from LOST, the kick-a chick from Alien and the isolation chamber guy from Altered States.

But then the reviews came in:  “a gimmick in search of a point” , “a fractured and frustrating narrative” and  “a 23-minute movie dragged out, via some narrative gimmickry, to a punishing hour and a half.”

So I didn’t see it at the theater but when this film popped up on DISH in HD, I did a little DVR and watched it over the weekend.  And you know what? It’s not bad. Not bad at all.

The whole “gimmick in search of a point” alludes to a style of film-making that is sometimes called the Rashomon effect, a reference to the 1950 Akira Kurosawa film of that name in which events are recounted from several perspectives.  Essentially, the film follows the story of a US President arriving at a peace conference in Spain and getting shot with two bombs going off in the aftermath.

I like the idea of seeing the same scene from different characters view points but after the 4th one, it starts to get a little old and I was ready for the story to advance.  There are a few unanswered questions (in terms of motivation for the terrorists) but overall I really enjoyed the movie. By the way, good car chase scene with Quaid driving.

Here’s a terrific trailer. (which won a Golden Trailer Award for best drama.)  I say catch it on cable or throw it in your Netflix cue for fun.

The film was a box-office success. In its opening weekend, it earned almost 23 million dollars in the United States and Canada, ranking #1 at the box office. It eventually grossed over $151 million worldwide.