I Witness (2003)

So many reviews I read attempt to bring this film in perspective versus Ms. Rowlings Potter films. It isn't necessary. Ms. Rowlings is a wonderful storyteller. Just enjoy the story and revel in her imagination for a couple of hours. Isn't loosing yourself what movie going is supposed to be about? As an added bonus, I feel certain that after seeing this film you will be looking forward to seeing the next installment. Ms. Rowlings will keep Warner Bros. in the money for years to come.The bad guys are bad. The good guys are good. There are children being children and adults being adults. It doesn't matter in Ms. Rowlings world if you are magical or muggle the traits within these groups stay the same. Children with hopes, desires, and fears. Adults with responsibilities. And young adults growing out of childhood and into adulthood trying to bridge the divide.One group trying to subjugate another. Another group trying to free those being suppressed. It's all so easy to relate to in our own lives whether you are a child, an adult, or one in-between. At least there are no zombies :)

I Witness is an overly earnest little film about politics, drugs and mass murder on the U.S./Mexico border. The basic idea of the story isn't that bad, but it was realized with too many characters, too little mystery and an ending where you can pinpoint the exact moment when these filmmakers decided to stop caring whether the movie made any sense or not.James Rhodes (Jeff Daniels) is a human rights activist who's been sent down to observe a vote to unionize at an American-owned chemical company in Tijuana. While he's there, Rhodes gets involved in the investigation of 27 dead Mexican peasants founds in a drug smuggling tunnel. The authorities want to blame it on a enigmatic drug lord, but Rhodes suspects there's something else going on. His search for answers is assisted by the prideful Detective Castillo (Clifton Collins Jr.) and his work with the unionization vote is complicated by pretty U.S. trade representative Emily Thomas (Portia de Rossi). There's also a U.S. State Department official named Douglas Draper (James Spader) who is an old friend of Rhodes. I think Draper was intended to be a significant character in this film, but he really just floats around and gives off that vibe that James Spader gave off when he was thin. As opposed to the vibe Spader has given off since he got fat. There aren't many actors whose on screen presence has changed so greatly over the course of their career. I really hope CGI reaches the point one day where thin Spader from Sex, Lies & Videotape can do a buddy cop movie with fat Spader from Boston Legal.Anyway…Rhodes just sort of wanders around from place to place, getting abducted by drug gangsters and pointedly NOT having sex with Emily, until a guy on his death bed explains the whole story to him. I don't want to give away the ending but let me just note, the moment when drug gangsters storm in like the cavalry to rescue Rhodes, even though there's absolutely no way they could know he needed rescuing and absolutely no reason they should rescue him in the first place, that's the moment when you know these filmmakers no longer care if I Witness makes any sense.Honestly, this isn't a horrendous film. Jeff Daniels is a perfectly acceptable hero, though he does look far too much like Jeff Bridges from the 1976 King Kong remake. The script is making a noble effort at saying something about the complexities of life, death and business on the U.S./Mexico border. I suppose the direction is adequate. But a paucity of plot, a phalanx of unnecessary characters and a plethora of poorly written scenes does produce a pedestrianly bad movie.

I cried a lot and more at the ending. It takes one to know one. Anyone who commented the film is not as exciting or thrilling enough has no idea about the reality at all. I am not Mexican nor am I a "professional" human rights activist. I identify with most characters on my journey and in my quest for the truths. I'm an American who was born Deaf exposed to an unknown racism called AUDISM. I come from high class society. Being a Deaf female of a high society where AUDISM practices within the Legal System is rampant, it is equivalent to the Badlands of the untamed Wild West under the disguise of elegance, etiquette and complete control. The surface looks so peaceful and idyllic. What makes Audism so deadly is no one except Deaf People knows about Audism and its' state of totalitarianism for the Deaf. People are accustomed to mass of people living in a state of totalitarianism, they are not conditioned to accept a state of totalitarianism also imprisons one lone solitary person. Deaf Americans faces same dangers and fear for their lives/ Rights/Freedom due to their stereotyped status of deafness, no different from people of 3rd world countries."I Witness" is very true. It's all about the money. It exists in free countries like U.S.A., not just in 3rd world countries.

All bad things that happens in Latin America is because the drugs dealers right? Wrong. This is what this movie is about. As a Latin American I saw a different point of view at this movie, something that is rare when the subject are "the third world countries". Usually Hollywood shows Latin America as poor, full of drug dealers, violence and ignorance. This movie shows the poor Latin America but starts to escape of stereotypes during the story, at certain point we discover that was not the drug cartel the responsible for the murderers but the police, what is a big difference compared with other movies that uses the same subject. This is what I most like in this movie, it shows that not everything that causes problems to the "third world" comes from drugs, some of the problems are sometimes caused by the big non-Latin American corporations and corrupted police.