The American. The first truely awful movie of 2010

Last night I had the opportunity to see an advance screening of the new George Clooney movie "The American" at the Brisbane International Film Festival, and all I can say is it is my contender for the worst movie of 2010 and my all time personal contender for the worst movie I have ever seen. I have seen my fair share of movies (I think you can gather that since I write a blog about my passion) but I have never wanted to walk out of a movie that thought being so called "artistic" was a way to hide such a boring, awful, go nowhere movie. I sat in the theatre for two hours and came out going, "what in the world was that even about?" I'm sorry to the fans of Clooney, but what you are about to read is not kind and I warn I can't help it. I have never wanted two hours back in my life so badly. People complain about all sorts of bad movie I mean I usually agree (I'm looking at you The Happening) but for people to think that artistic movies are the way to say, "oh so different, it means this, or the lighting in the scene was to show his internal emotions" can just go shut up. There is nothing artistic about this movie. It is Hollywood and Mr Clooney trying to be too smart for his audience and trust me I am not the only one who thought this. Let me begin.

The plot. Well was there one? I still am unsure what this movie is about. But here is a quick rundown of what happened. Clooney at the start is shot at in Sweden. We are left to wonder why has this guy got a gun, and why has he just killed two hit men? It turns out Clooney is an assassin who wants to get out (which takes about 60 minutes to even find out) when he contacts, I guess you could say, his boss (even though it is never mentioned) Pavel (Johan Leyson). He must help a woman Mathilde (Thelka Reuten) with one last job. So he goes about building firearms (had no idea that he could do but apparently he could just whip it up) for her to end his association with the business. Throw in a hooker, a priest and his desire to leave Sweden for Italy and there is the plot. It MADE NO SENSE.

Here is where the problem lies. Clooney and I will blame him for this crap. When looking at Batman and Robin that film is Oscar worthy compared to this piece. As I was saying before, taking 45 minutes to show me Clooney pout, snarl, not utter a entire line, do push ups, work on a gun, drink wine and coffee, sleep with a hooker is not a movie. There is no plot. There is no understanding of the back story and there was not one character who you could even remotely connect with. The pace of this movie is so bad I fell asleep three times. I swear I could see my arm hair grow faster than the running time of this movie. It is awful. And you might be going, but isn't that what arty movies are meant to be?Trust me I like art house movies, but they don't try to be too smart for an audience. This just makes the audience feel dumb for paying for this shit.

George Clooney you should be wanting to get this piece of crap off your resume fast. If you don't do another Oceans, you may have to resort to asking for a job back on television where you started off on. You may have an Oscar, but your choice in movies lately is just really well, stupid. The only movie I thought of yours in the last two years that was worth mentioning was Fantastic Mr Fox (hilarious movie rent it) and you were only a voice in that. Please don't insult me again George Clooney. This was just plain bad, and even if you think it is art, it's not. It is just a smokescreen for you to think your audience is dumb. I couldn't even care about writing about the director as if I was him, would really want to destroy ever copy and remove my name from this picture. This is seriously the worst movie I have ever seen in my life. I hated it if you hadn't already gathered that. I know in my blog I am meant to appreciate all kinds of films, but there is not one single thing I liked about this movie. If I ever see George Clooney he better pay me forward my $13 bucks I spent on this crap. 1/10