Sahara (2005)

Number Rolled: 12

Movie Name/Year: Sahara (2005)

Genre: Action & Adventure

Length: 124 minutes

Rating: PG-13

Director: Breck Eisner

Writer: Clive Cussler, Thomas Dean Donnelly, Joshua Oppenheimer, John C. Richards, James V. Hart

Actors: Matthew McConaughey, Steve Zahn, Penelope Cruz, William H. Macy, Rainn Wilson, Delroy Lindo, Lambert Wilson, Lennie James, Robert Cavanah, Clint Dyer, Daniel Lobe, Glynn Turman

Dirk is obsessed with the whereabouts of a lost, Civil War era, battleship. After finishing a treasure find with his crew, he obtains permission to head to the Sahara in order to locate the ship. Dragging along two of his friends, and a doctor he saved from thugs on the beach, he heads off to locate clues. Unfortunately for them, what’s supposed to be a calm treasure hunt turns into much more when his case and the case of a spreading plague intertwine.

I’m not a fan of McConaughey (to put it lightly), so when I rolled one of his movies I groaned, sat back on the couch and prepared myself to watch him slur through another run of the mill script. However, I found he actually did pretty well with this movie. In fact, there were times that I was able to forget who was playing Dirk. Aside from his glaring lack of chemistry with Penelope Cruz, he actually felt just right next to Steve Zahn. Since they were the two main characters in the movie, it’s almost acceptable that scenes between McConaughey and Cruz seem to be forced.

This movie requires a great amount of your time be spent in suspending disbelief. If you can manage to meet the staggering requirement for that request, it’s a fun movie. Physics, science, history and geography are all completely ignored… but if we can accept cars that transform into sentient beings, we can accept what they’ve thrown at us here.

I was able to move past the technical issues enough that I actually enjoyed the movie. Although it’s long, the story is fast-paced and doesn’t leave you longingly staring at the clock. It’s not one of my favorite movies, but it wasn’t bad.

Overall Opinion – 3.1/5

P.S. This movie was based off a book of the same name by Clive Cussler.