This, much anticipated and critically despised movie, is about a man who gets kidnapped in South America by a vigilante group and his wife who works with a hostage negotiator to get him out.

There are a lot of things wrong with this movie. Despite everything, this movie is interesting and not bad at all.

The biggest disappointment is Meg Ryan. I am not sure what the deal with her is but I can't understand how one goes from doing 'Courage under fire' to You've got mail and now this disaster performance in Proof of Life. Complete lack of emotion, wrong body language and no chemistry or on screen presence. The movie loses too much because of her.

Russel Crowe is clinically precise but uninteresting as a professional risk and hostage negotiater. I think he did this role pretty much in off-hours after the big Gladiator from the same year.

Direction is another major problem. The movie with such an interesting premise was mostly uninteresting. This pretty much kills it. The whole idea about the negotiator finding out on his own where the kidnapped man is -- is lost because he finds it out by luck -- and that too someone else's.