An average movie

To be honest, I thought the title of this movie sounded rather lame but since I have a weak spot for Lasse Hallstrom's work, I was still eager to check it out. Unfortunately, like most of his recent work, the whole thing was rather underwhelming and it seems that the guy has pretty much lost his touch. I mean, in those days of economic crisis, this concept of a sheik spending 50 millions of pounds so he could fish salmon in his home country was a tough sell and, honestly, rather inappropriate. Concerning Ewan McGregor and Emily Blut, I don't think they should be blamed as they both managed to give life to their characters and they delivered some decent performances. The main issue was more concerning the tone. Indeed, later on I have discovered that this movie was an adaptation of a best selling book in the UK and, in fact, this book was a political satire which made much more sense. Unfortunately, the only remaining thing concerning this satire was Kristin Scott Thomas's character which was obviously the best asset in this flick. Instead, Hallstrom decided to change this story into something inspirational with a romantic subplot but it was a rather poor choice, I'm afraid. To conclude, I still think it was a decent watch but it could have been much better if they would have chosen the right angle.

6/10