THE BRAVE (3 outta 5 stars) Bear in mind that this review is based on an incomplete version of the film which was missing 25 minutes in the middle. However, I doubt that those 25 minutes will affect my rating much anyway... so here goes. Johnny Depp plays a down-on-his-luck Native American/Mexican (yes, it is a bit of a stretch... but just go with it) who makes a deal with an eccentric movie producer to star in a "snuff film". Depp gets some money in advance and gets one last week to spend with his family before the movie starts shooting. They live on the outer edges of a huge garbage dump. Raphael (Depp) figures that the money he makes from doing the film will be enough for his family to move away and find themselves a real home. To explain his newfound wealth, Depp tells the rest of the town that he got a new warehouse job but they wonder why he is so reluctant to help anybody else get on there. It's a very slow-paced movie and never got released in North America. (It is currently only available as an import... many of which, apparently, have a 25 minute section missing in the middle. Honestly, if I hadn't noticed that the film was only 91 minutes long instead of the promised 118 and gone to investigate some IMDb threads I would never have noticed scenes were missing. The movie still seems to flow well... even though it does seem too short.) Nice try by Depp (who also directed) but the movie doesn't quite have the power of the novel it was adapted from.
