Review: Sahara

Rated PG-13 | 124 mins

IMDB Info

There is a scene in Sahara in which practically hundreds of bullets fly through the remnants of a civil-war boat which somehow naturally found its way to the African desert from North America, over time. The three main characters use boat as a means of shielding themselves from the gunfire and, despite the fact that it is basically blown to bits by the end of the scene, they make it out unscratched. At this point in the movie, many viewers will find themselves screaming “Yeah, right!” at the screen, trying to pretend that one of its goals is realism. I, on the other hand, developed some sort of geeky admiration for such sequences. For me, Sahara played like a rough, updated version Indiana Jones, in which the characters had greater survival-skills than Indy himself, but never realized this. A great picture it is not—perhaps it isn’t even a good one—but it is made and performed with such great energy and enthusiasm that it’s impossible not to like. By embracing Sahara’s silliness every step of the way, unlike those who participated in the filming of last year’s naively-constructed Day After Tomorrow, everyone involved clearly had fun making it. As forgettable as it is, this is the kind of movie that could be watched fifteen times without it ever really tiring. Not to mention the fact that Penelope Cruz looks as astonishing as could be—and then some—despite the grime she encounters running around the desert for two hours. The only question the film really left me with was: why weren’t any of the four screenwriters smart enough to include a role for Cruz’s fellow Oscar-presenter from this past year, the just-as-tantalizing Salma Hayek?