Same Kind of Different as Me (film) : Great cast, great idea, nice story; rubbish film

They really had all the pieces in place to turn this into a blockbuster tear-jerker film. The story is inspiring, the cast of Greg Kinnear, Renée Zellweger, Djimon Hounsou, and even Jon Voight were all in place, and the story it is based upon is actually something that happened.

Yet, somehow, this movie is just awful and I am not sure why that is.

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Without revealing too much of the plot let's just say that a very rich family headed by Ron and Debbie Hall (played by Kinnear and Zellweger and are also portraying real people) in a roundabout way decide to become patrons of a homeless shelter in a very different part of town that they live in. The become actively involved in trying to help out their homeless community in Texas.

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While volunteering there they are kind and helping towards everyone and this invokes several touching moments but Ron and Debbie are drawn to a particularly troubled member of the homeless community that is known by most as "Suicide" but they later fine out is named Denver (played by Djimon Hounsou - one of my favorite actors.) Their attempts at befriending him are initially met with aggression but eventually they break through and become friends.

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What happens next is something that I can only describe as something that was meant to be touching and meaningful but unfortunately, either due to poor screen-writing or direction, becomes a convoluted mess that honestly, simply takes too long to get anywhere. Also, despite the fact that I really really like him as an actor, Hounsou just seems really static and boring in his portrayal of Denver but to be fair everyone else's character is really boring also.

Even once Jon Voight is introduced as a drunken, racist, patriarch... which I had thought might move the story a bit, is introduced, the movie just has this horribly slow and boring pace that just leaves us asking throughout the 2 hours that this movie is on... "where is this going and can we get on with it already?"

With such a star-studded cast (which is what drew me in in the first place,) it is truly amazing to me that this movie ended up being as terrible as it was. I have to admit that there were certain segments of it that still (despite the boredom) managed to bring some water to my eyes, but this had a lot to do with musical choices rather than me actually being moved by the scenes that were taking place or me being engaged with the story at all.

_{From the official Paramount Pictures channel}

While I totally agree that the overall message of this film is profound and is something I truly want to be adopted by everyone... the movie is just really really poor. I am not a film-maker so I don't know exactly where they effed up but I don't think it is in one place. It's just a mess across the board.

A lot of the problem exists perhaps in the extensive reliance on flashbacks to explain Denver's predicament in life and this is not done well. During all of these sequences a relatively monotone Djimon Hounsou explains scene after scene to a completely quiet Kinnear and Zellwegger. At the end of all of these sequences Hounsou emerges with tears in his eyes and each one of these incidences are meant to be tear-jerking but since there are so many of them in the film, we get desensitized and honestly, it gets to the point where you just want something to happen in the film.

And therein might lie the problem - while the real story is touching it might not be exciting enough to warrant a film in the first place.

The movie is based on real-life events and don't get me wrong, i am not trying to take away from that (it was a best-selling book also.) All I'm trying to say is that a production company is capable of getting a hold of a good story, a great cast, and a decent budget, and still make a horrible film.

This is that film

Same Kind of Different as Me barely made back its budget of $6.5 million and after marketing, likely lost money.

My overall rating