Master and Commander is not doing the business expected and it just goes to show that audiences somehow or other sense when a movie isn't all that great. This movie, which has a ton of good things about it, is a total and complete mess where it counts most; the ending. (And at the box office.)

A note to director peter Wier: Bad guys wear black hats and good guys wear white hats. That's so the audience can tell the good guys from the bad ones. D.W. Griffith understood that; Erich van Stroheim got that; Cecil B DeMille too; but not Peter Wier. The final battle scene is a total mess because some genius came up with the idea to disguise the English as French. You cannot tell who is who, even Russel Crowe is clouded in smoke sometimes. Who are the French? Who are the Brits? Everybody knows that the French wear blue and the Brits wear red. Except for this fucking mess. Never in my life, except for the equally flawed "Heaven's Gate", have I seen a movie that had a major battle that didn't "work".

To top it off, I couldn't understand all the Goddam Brit accents which meant I was lost a good deal of the time. A decent movie but hardly the sensation that critics say it is. Wait for the video if you have a good system at home because at $8 to $15 it is not worth it. Cat in the Hat and Elf are doing the big box office right now.

And who ever the fuck thought that "Bad Santa" during the Holiday Season was a good idea is probably working at Disney. Picking up cigarette butts at one of their Theme Parks. The "critics" hated Cat in the Hat, audiences love it (any of these fag critics have kids?). Not too thrilled with Gothika, audiences love it. Only Elf has both critics and audience approval.

So what has happened to "Mystic River"? It may be that audiences absolutely hate the Hollywood Left movie stars because this very good movie (about disgusting people) is doing nothing. Matrix etc. is another violent movie released for the Holidays and it is bombing big time. I'd say this is not a Holiday Season for any movie that isn't an upper for the family. Nobody is going to take the kiddies to see Master and Commander, Matrix etc., Bad Santa, or any of the gore and whore pics the genius crowd in Hollywood decided needed to be made.