Pretty pointless "comedy"
8 November 2001
Betsy (Patricia Arquette) and Peter (Tate Donovan) rob a carnival and go on the run. To hide out they return to the religious commune where Peter grew up. He hides the money and then promptly dies. To remain in the commune and find the money Betsy marries Peter's younger brother Ezekiel (Joseph Gordon-Levitt), leading to "comedy", "adventure" and "love".....

What could be better than a comedy set in an Amish-style community starring Patricia Arquette and directed by Spock? Well - quite a lot actually. The plot is pretty thin and all the "comedy" revolves around the mis-match of the boy and his adult wife. This gets very thin very quickly, leaving only the "thriller" plot of the dirty FBI agent hunting the money himself (John Schuck). Unfortunately the thriller element doesn't work either.

Patricia Arquette is poor in the lead role playing a very unsympathetic character that flicks between two emotions - angry and repentant. Gordon-Levitt is good as Ezekiel and has some of the few funny moments in the film. However he is hampered by the poor material he has to work with. Support from Donovan and Schuck is as poor as you'd expect.

It's not a terrible film but it's just all so lame. There's nothing to really make you feel strongly either way and to me that's worse than a film that's laughably bad. The whole project is pointless.
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