AniInterview Sorry, this movie sucks

ScoobyWell Great visuals, story delivers no surprises

Arianna Moses Let me be very fair here, this is not the best movie in my opinion. But, this movie is fun, it has purpose and is very enjoyable to watch.

Brennan Camacho Mostly, the movie is committed to the value of a good time.

christineporter2 I'd never heard of this movie until it showed up on premium cable TV. I'm so glad it did, but wish it had gained the respect and popularity it so deserved. The young men and woman actors captured the despair, fear, and hopefulness of what the young refugees must have experienced perfectly. The one scene in this movie that touched my heart more than any in this, or any other movie, was the one where the orphans are settling into thier new home on the first night. It is just getting dark and you can see the worry on thier faces. I myself have been in a new place/situation many times in my own life. This scene reminded me vividly of what I'd almost forgotten. I remembered being in a new place, lying there as it was just getting dark, and feeling so afraid and longing for people and places I loved. No matter how happy one might be to be in a new place, that fear and longing are such a strong feeling. I thought Reese, though a good actress overall, over-acted a bit in this film. Her dialog AND her delivery, were a bit too trite. Doesn't take away from the movie though. I highly recommend it to everyone.

pierfconsa Just a heap of common places, clichés and overall unrealistic depiction of southern Sudanese people, Africans in general. I confidently watched the movie seeing all these good reviews but could not really even watch it all. I am unsure if anyone who has liked this has ever lived in Africa. and I can't believe people would believe African are so naive and aloof.

skanz This film did not have a theatre release here in my country, it came out on DVD today. I had seen the trailer and was looking forward to it. I had read several comments criticising the film for being about white people heroically and selflessly saving the black people. Even the IMDb web page says "their encounter with an employment agency counsellor forever changes all of their lives." Reese Witherspoon is the star attraction so people will notice the film, but she is not the main character of the story, her's is a supporting role, which she does well. If anything the encounter with the Sudanese refugees changes her character's life forever. On an emotional level the film is deeply affecting. The employment agency agent or the charity representative would have had more depth and connection if one or the other was played by an American woman of African descent. There is a tribal link between white Americans and Sudanese people but it is so far back as to be far beyond the longest oral tradition. I guess it was contrast rather than convergence the film maker wanted- their choice.The brutality of the war in Sudan is not graphically portrayed as violence often is in modern films. Graphic violence has a tendency to shut down the viewers empathy- a defensive measure I suppose. Without plastic guts and synthetic gore to be shocked at and to immunise us from the pain of others, the viewer starts to care about the family and their ordeal. I started seriously leaking water at one point, and kept springing leaks at numerous points thereafter. As a male, I do this very very rarely, and watching films, at most brim a bit, I never ever suffer rivulets down cheeks until now. I needed tissues. Tissues! The fish out of water comedy was gentle and the characters were not made out as ignorant or gullible, but eager and quick to learn. What they have to learn from first world culture is superficial however, just like the culture. More important is what they have to teach us first worlders. But to learn first you have to acknowledge there is something you can learn from uneducated poor people from a third world country. I think the film makers did just that.

srsandsberry A lot of stories based on real-life stories don't feel like real life. They feel like a story reborn within a storyteller's imagination to make it somehow more appealing, a better package. Not "The Good Lie." It feels real. And it engenders real emotion. If you can watch this movie and not laugh and feel warm at the heartwarming parts — as we do in real life — and cry at the heartbreaking moments, then you're not watching. You're texting or having a conversation, or thinking about what you're going to do this weekend. If you give yourself over to this film, it will absolutely pull you inside, wrap itself around you and touch your heart. You will laugh. And yes, you will cry. This story puts a very human face on a very human tragedy, that otherwise we might too often look at simply as a headline on an inside page of the newspaper that we pass over to get to something that isn't so hard to fathom.I applaud the people who made this film and thank them. Any filmmaker on the planet would be proud to have been associated with this. I know I would be, and all I am is a guy who stumbled upon it on HBO. What a find.