This is How Movies Should Be Made

an ambitious but ultimately ineffective debut endeavor.

This is a small, humorous movie in some ways, but it has a huge heart. What a nice experience.

Just intense enough to provide a much-needed diversion, just lightweight enough to make you forget about it soon after it’s over. It’s not exactly “good,” per se, but it does what it sets out to do in terms of putting us on edge, which makes it … successful?

I didn't see this in an IMAX theater, but on a 3d HDTV. In searching for material that demonstrates the technology, a shopper can be challenged unless you want four of the "Shrek" movies or horror films that are good for perhaps one viewing.But this film is educational, beautiful and a spectacular subject for a 3D film. The soundtrack by Dave Matthews keeps any of it from being tiresome. The river rafting sequences are well-placed and the aerial shots inspiring.The participants, Robert Redford and Robert Kennedy, Jr., add gravitas without being too heavy with the purpose of the film: Conservation of fresh water and the world-wide crisis.This is a stunning film visually, and the camera spends a great deal of time "in love" with its subject: the American Southwest.

This should have been a great experience, even if it was a bit preachy.However, some moron used the noise of one of the least talented people ever in the music business, Dave Matthews, for almost the entire audio. His nerve racking chalkboard on fingernails not only ruins any possible enjoyment, but distracts from whatever else is shown or said.The visuals were working well. Most of us got this tape to see the video, and learn more about the area. True, Redford and gang made this into more of a propaganda film, but the propaganda is based on what I believe to be good Science, simply because it is Science without an agenda. No one gets rich by exposing global warming. Instead, the only corporate interests are in drowning out talk of global warming.But this really shouldn't be about preaching politics. That is a bad format, and politics in a spectacle should be much more subtle. That said, the formula for the film probably could have been more informative than political.The ideas were well founded, and structured in a decent way. This narrative could have been watchable, except for one thing. The grinding of Matthews and his band. It is IMPOSSIBLE for any one not on severe drugs to listen to this more than a few minutes, and we want to hear the narration. Matthews must really hate Redford to ruin his narration with this garbage.This should be remade, with a better band. Of course there is always the chance that the narration will be equally ruined by some of the other no talent big name bands out there.

Save for some very nice white water rafting shots, this movie was a ripoff. Three different narrators preaching in pious and ominous tones saying things that weren't even self-consistent.I went to this movie because I am going to the Grand Canyon next week and wanted to learn more about the park, the flora, fauna, the river, the geology, the anthropology, etc.. Instead, I got a 50 minutes sermon about nonsense like shower head flow restrictors. There was one convservation point that made sense: those using the water for agriculture should pay a reasonable amount for the water which will justify much more efficient irrigation methods.I, as some other reviewers have noted, found the changing narrators confusing also.

I mean really, what can I say? While I won't go so far as to say it was a waste of money, I just felt like it was a 45 minute sermon that was meant to make me feel guilty for existing on earth (and living in the Southern Nevada desert). The film spent the first 10 minutes talking about the lake in Chad and showing graphs and pictures of the two dams that are affecting the Colorado's flow. Nothing positive or beneficial was mentioned about how these dams create power and resources for the thirsty areas of the desert, nor about the jobs the dams have been able to create and sustain. Instead, there was a condemnation of what was done over half a century ago in Nevada and nearly as long in Glen Canyon.What I would have liked to have seen was a film that showed the Grand Canyon in all it's majesty and glory from the very beginning. A nature film should dazzle the senses from the moment it comes on screen. This film instead, has at least 3 different narrators whose voices ominously appear and then disappear throughout the film to the point that you have no idea whose talking at different points. What I would have liked to have seen (or heard) was Robert Redford's voice consistently through the film, introducing each person's voice and then coming on again after that person had spoken. Instead, it was Redford, then Wade Davis' voice, then his daughter's voice, then Bobby Kennedy Jr's voice and then back to Redford, then Bobby Kennedy's daughter and I must not forget that the Indian Woman gets her chance to shine. It might just be me, but I think consistency to the structure of the film is the key to a film like this.A more powerful way to have presented the argument in this film would have been to show the beauty of the nature of the Grand Canyon and the mighty Colorado. It would have been nice to have highlighted a brief history of the developments along the Colorado and then near the end brought to light the plight of the river and what the future could hold. Rather, what ends up happening is a consistent barrage of condemnation toward those who've settled the west from the opening of the film to it's last pathetic attempt to show us how we too, can conserve the earth's resources.