recommended

Nice effects though.

The story, direction, characters, and writing/dialogue is akin to taking a tranquilizer shot to the neck, but everything else was so well done.

Mostly, the movie is committed to the value of a good time.

This is not a mindless action movie, this is an extremely well written and well acted film. I am a Jim Morrison fan, and have watched Morrison's short film 'Highway' about 20 times. 'Mojave' is obviously patterned after it and they have done an incredible job capturing the magic of a discontented rich celebrity who goes to the Mojave desert to find clarity. I like the fact that the lead never breaks and never becomes a victim, instead he becomes more deadly than the psycho genius haunting his world.

Richard Roeper gave it 4/4. I give it 2/5. It was a cool premise that went nowhere really fast. Acting was good. Story was meh.I only wish it had a lot more going for it. It was like showing up to a BBQ but only being served salad. Definitely not recommending.

Tom (Garrett Hedlund)is a suicidal artist who travels into the desert and whilst out in the desert, he meets drifter Jack (Oscar Isaac). Initially thinks are OK between the two men but they quickly fall out and start arguing and fighting. Tom manages to get the better of Jack and abandons him in the middle of the desert, but Jack isn't prepared to let it go and wants his revenge against Tom.A film like Mojave should have been a no-brainer; two men have an argument and a fight and one of the men is a sociopath who the other man abandons in the desert and for this reason said sociopath hunts down the other man to gain his revenge. With this kind of simple plotting, how could this film possibly not work? Well the answer is that whilst the plot in itself is simplistic, Monahan drags it out in all sorts of directions without ever really offering us much of an understanding for what is going on? At the start of the film, I sensed that Tom was a troubled soul, but could never work out why? Perhaps developing his character more would have helped. It also doesn't help that he's pretty unlikeable as well and in all honesty I just didn't really care what happened to him to be honest?Another problem with this film is that I never really felt much fear for the protagonist- he seems to be able to handle himself and whilst Oscar Isaac is presumably supposed to be intimidating I found him a bit too cartoonish and never felt scared for Tom at any point (thus pretty much all the tension in the picture was removed as far as I was concerned). Mojave is 90 minutes long, but it doesn't really cover this ground particularly well. A lot of the dialogue is either meaningless or dull and all the various strands to the story don't seem to add up to much and it has to be said that as a whole it is neither enlightening nor is it particularly entertaining. There is a scene later in the film between Tom and Jack where you feel as though Monahan was trying to recreate the scene between Robert De Niro and Al Pacino in Heat, but it is nowhere near as effective.The performances are perhaps as good as could be expected; Isaac is always good value, but I felt that if his character had been more menacing or threatening then he could have got more out of this role. Hedlund is OK and Mark Wahlberg is good fun as an 'up-his-own-backside' producer.Mojave probably would have been a better film if it would have been more simplistic; leave the two guys out in the desert playing a game of 'cat and mouse'. However, Monahan's decision to separate the two men and fill the majority of the running time with scene after scene of meaningless dialogue and poor character development results in a film that is dull and mostly uninteresting.Sometimes a less is more approach should be adopted with films and a film like Mojave is definitely a case in point.

What a mess. I'm not gonna pick the movie apart because it would take too long. My problem is with the 2 main characters. The hero and the bad guy, both were portrayed to be certified "bad asses". How did they get to be so good with guns, has like a built in human tracking device in the head, cunning, intelligent, like trained cia operatives whatnot you name it. I have to mention this, so the sad hero goes into the desert drunk as sh** steals a rifle from a wandering bum after having a philosophical conversation because fk you, no time to explain, right? This bum happens to be some sort of serial killer. So the sad drunk hero goes into a cave to sleep, was awoken by something, I don't know fk you. Takes a split second to aim like 10 meters away and blam right on the money.How did the 2 main characters become so bad ass and can do remarkable things? We don't. They did not give in the important details. But what they did show us is that the suicidal protagonist is actually rich and famous. After the desert scene. What is he famous for? making film and sh**? How did he get to be that knowledgeable and stuff? We just don't fking know man. Then the bad guy, a washed up bum. Wow really? Well how the hell did he...Hold up! let me stop you there, we wont/don't fking know.Lol and the side characters (Matt Damon and the guy from The Shield) Both bad asses that smoke and drink all day But is more built that regular gym rats. One thing I know is that I did not enjoy the mess. But If you dare to watch it, you wouldn't know some things as well, ya know?