I adore you. You are a genius and you're dead sexy to boot. On even your worst day, you make Marlon Brando look like Pauly Shore. I'm sorry to say, darling, this was your worst day.
You're as good as you can be in this movie. I am a hockey fanatic, so please don't write me off as some woman who hates sports and doesn't understand sports movies. I just didn't like Mystery, Alaska. I hope you understand. It has nothing to do with you. It's everything else about it that annoyed me.
Let's go down the list, shall we? I should have realized that we were in for a treat when I discovered David E. Kelley produced Alaska. Just like Ally McBeal, Alaska is a big, silly male fantasy devoid of any female characters with common sense or something to say. One (Rachel Wilson)is a nymphomaniac; another one (Megyn Price) beats in her boyfriend's head with a shovel. Lolita Davidovich's character has three scenes and her big contribution to the story is to cheat on her husband with a virile stud-boy (Ron Eldard). It would have been less insulting if the female characters had been completely absent.
Burt Reynolds was a big, walking Smithfield. He was absolutely painful to watch. Not only was he clearly not doing his best job, his role was so one-note and trite. The father-son storyline involving his character and Birdie (Scott Grimes) has been done a thousand times before and much better.
Doesn't Michael McKean come in and sue somebody at one point? Why? He comes in, gets shot, sues, loses, the end. His two lines have, like, seven swear words in them, and as far as I can tell, he was just put in to have somebody who could swear well.
During parts of this film, I felt like I was watching American Pie; namely, the bits with Stevie Weeks (Ryan Northcott). What was that? Did they think all the guys would stop watching pretty soon if they didn't hurry up and put some sex in there? Wasn't this movie supposed to be about hockey? Where's the hockey? The hockey was in the last twenty or so minutes, which was the only good thing about this movie.
Unfortunately, when the Rangers do show up, they act like the English in Braveheart. I know they're the enemy and they're all grouchy to have to be there and everything, but such heavy-handed villany is kind of boring. Still, it was a little bit of hockey during the NHL off-season. I was glad to see real Rangers and small cameos by Steve Levy and Barry Melrose.
Anyway, Russell, I like you very, very much and I kept Alaska in the VCR to watch you. You do the All-American Mr. Nice Guy very well. You looked great. Maybe comedies just aren't your forte. But if you do more, you know I'll see them.
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