American Made

Cruise's performance is great, and the film is very well made. But I didn't like it. The film treads a difficult moral path. Cruise's character (based on a real drug smuggler) is a cavalier hustler, which means the are times we are encouraged to root for him. The film tries to play it down, but they're caught between a rock and hard place. Make him too unsympathetic, and you run the risk of alienating your audience. Instead, it tries to tread a middle ground. Personally, I found the character absolutely loathsome, even with all his charm. He was a sociopath. The real Barry Seal was an unattractive, overweight man, who got his brother killed, and thousands of Americans while working for a corrupt US government. I found it impossible to go along with the film's idea that he was a happy go lucky entrepreneur.

I can't give this movie 2 stars or 3 stars, so im given it what I think it deserves, 2.5 stars, bang right in the middle. I was really looking forward to this movie but it was a let down. The movie needed to slow down at times. Its very hard to fully enjoy a movie going at that speed for around 150 mins. They needed to just slow it down at times and see the human side of the characters story with the story and then start to pick up steam again. If this movie was just a sell tickets fast paced action somewhat trill popcorn movie it achieved it, but if it was suppose to be a little bit more than that, it failed in my opinion.

It's a watchable movie as so many of these rags to riches, drug smuggling movies are. I wish film makers didn't have to keep using leading actors in the belief it will sell the movie. As charismatic & wierd as Tom Cruise is, he just looks out of place in the role, thus 3 stars. But if like me you can find nothing else to watch or do it'll keep you entertained.