Very disappointing...

Sick Product of a Sick System

Overrated and overhyped

For all the hype it got I was expecting a lot more!

I stopped watching Saturday Night Live long before Tina Fey joined the cast, so I was almost completely unfamiliar with her when I read her book Bossypants a couple of months ago. That book made me a fan of her great intelligence and humor. This movie added to my appreciation, to the point where I can say, in a non-obsessive fandom sort of way, I love Tina Fey. This film blew me away. Her presentation of her character's personal and professional evolution was outstanding. I also was very impressed by Billy Bob Thornton and good old Alfred Molina--one of our best character actors, whom I did not recognize until almost the end of the film--as well as Martin Freeman and Margot Robbie.The movie was so realistic that I thought they'd actually filmed in Asia. I was amazed that most of it was filmed in New Mexico. To borrow the vernacular of the script, this is a great movie, or maybe a fucking great movie. I loved it.

The film is loosely based on a true story. Desk jockey Kim Baker (Tina Fey) volunteers to go to Afghanistan to cover the war with the Taliban. We see the initial cultural shock and then her quick adaptation and acceptance of the life style. She gets to the point where she becomes addicted to the rush from getting a dangerous story. While on assignment she loses a boyfriend and gains a boyfriend (Martin Freeman).I enjoyed the film for what it was, but not for the comedy they attempted to sell it as. They cut every funny clip from the film and showed them as previews. When those clips are watched in context, they lose their humor (plus I've seen them before.) This was not a strong role for Fey, although the content of the plot kept it alive. I have mixed thoughts about the use/misuse of Harry Nilsson. Is that the song they really wanted? Guide: Plenty of swearing. Brief sex scene. No nudity.

When my mom, brother and I first sat down to watch this, we were honestly expecting a comedy littered with laughs and sharp wit. Then when we really got into it, there was nothing funny about this. I have no idea why this was labeled as a comedy when it really wasn't. It was probably because of Tina Fey that it was labeled like that...but it didn't matter to us. We enjoyed it every step of the way. Probably another thing that made it good was the fact that it was based off of a true story and Tina channeled the model for the movie perfectly.I had no idea that Ms. Fey was capable of drama until I watched this. I had previously seen her in "Mean Girls" and "Sisters," both of which were comedies, of course. This, on the other hand, is much different. She is a reporter who goes over to Afghanistan to chronicle the horrors of war and gets involved with a number of interesting people along the way.The only person that I could have easily lived without in this movie was Margot Robbie. It made no sense to me to have her in there and Tina, for all intents and purposes, ignored her throughout the whole thing. (Probably because Margot's voice is equivalent to nails on a chalkboard.) If Margot was trying to steal Tina's thunder, Tina wasn't having it. She was the star, not Margot. It was just that simple.This film just proves time and time again that Tina can tackle comedy as well as drama. As I said before, my mom, brother and I all enjoyed this movie and were very pleased with what we saw, primarily because of the previews that we saw with other movies and on TV commercials. If you're expecting a fall-down funny movie with this, you will be mistaken. Take this as a drama that is not loaded with a lot of violence, just thematic elements seen with a time of war. You may like what you see.

This comedy wasn't full of laughs, but it didn't tell much of a story either. It simply drifted. The soundtrack forces the movie to read as a romantic comedy, and is oddly pensive and optimistic at moments when people are being gunned down. Perhaps the film was actually meant to be a romantic comedy. Despite being about an independent female reporter in Afghanistan, the most interesting storyline is Kim's relationship with Bilbo Baggins (Martin Freeman). I did enjoy how as the movie progressed, the once scary and threatening Afghanistan had turned into "home" for Kim.