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Instead, you get a movie that's enjoyable enough, but leaves you feeling like it could have been much, much more.

This is a must-see and one of the best documentaries - and films - of this year.

The movie is made so realistic it has a lot of that WoW feeling at the right moments and never tooo over the top. the suspense is done so well and the emotion is felt. Very well put together with the music and all.

The story, direction, characters, and writing/dialogue is akin to taking a tranquilizer shot to the neck, but everything else was so well done.

This is a beautiful movie in so many ways. The beginning made me feel for the main character, Andrew, and how utterly numb he truly was. The situation didn't seem to matter at all; he just didn't feel anything due to the medication he was on. We then get to follow him through a couple of days when he goes back home for his mother's funeral, and this turns out to be a major game changer for him. He decides to stop taking his medicine, he meet up with old friends... and he meet a girl. It's an emotional (no pun intended) journey with a lot of character growth involved. It's very well done by Zach Braff who not only played Andrew but also wrote and directed the movie.The girl, Sam, was kind of weird, though. Not necessarily a bad thing, but I didn't really get as attached to her as I would have liked to. But I have to say that Natalie Portman did an amazing job playing her. It was just the character who wasn't really "my kind of character". But she did add humor to the equation. I'll give her that.As a person suffering from mental health issues and taking medication for it, and also being a nurse, I did feel that the movie might give the wrong idea concerning some things. Like, yeah, for this guy to suddenly stop taking his pills turned out just fine, even though this in no way means that he's all of a sudden completely okay again. But I do think that it can give the idea that if you stop taking your pills the world will become clearer and you'll be that much closer to feeling okay, cause there's so much more to it than that.But as a whole this is a movie that I really liked. It makes me feel good and in a way it also gives me hope.

Andrew Largeman (Zach Braff) returns to his hometown in order to attend his mother's funeral. Because he is an actor, many of Andrew's friends see him as a 'big shot' and upon his return home Andrew is treated as a bit of a celebrity. However, Andrew is a troubled man with a troubling past who strikes up a friendship (and eventually) a relationship with Sam (Natalie Portman) a young woman with troubles of her own.It's clear from this film that Braff is setting up a narrative that brings together two seemingly different people who aren't actually all that different. It isn't an entirely original concept, but it's one that can really pull at the heartstrings if it's executed correctly. Unfortunately, Garden State gets some things right and some things wrong...One issue I had with this film is that I never really felt that Braff offered much development to any of his characters; his friends just seemed to be a rather clichéd bunch of frat-boy doofuses which actually made the first 20 minutes or so of the picture to be a particularly painful experience. Sam is an interesting character and I really hoped that more would have been made out of her being a compulsive liar - perhaps a bit of character depth or complexity to explain away her reasons for choosing to lie. Instead of this, you end up with Sam mentioning now and again that she's a compulsive liar and then her mentioning that she doesn't know why she lies, but that's all you get. There's little insight or depth to the picture which at times makes it hard to care what's happening. I could argue the same point with Andrew; a big deal is made about his past and his reasons for disappearing, but again all these details are skimmed over rather than being analysed deeper and I couldn't help but feel that the narrative was a tad simplistic at times. There is some animosity between Largeman and his father which could have been interesting, but is barely given any focus at all resulting in their exchanges having very little bearing on the picture.The one thing running in this film's favour are that both Andrew and Sam are likable and despite the narrative and character weaknesses I did actually find their blossoming relationship believable and kind of endearing. Natalie Portman is another selling point for this film giving a wonderfully quirky and edgy performance - it's a pity really that she didn't have more of a character to work with. Braff is OK, but is no match for Portman and I think he knows it. Sarsgaard is energetic, but his character is annoying and never really feels important to the story. Holm is in this film, but isn't really given anything to do.Garden State has its moments and both Braff and Portman are likable enough and share good chemistry and yes I did find their romance believable and engaging. However, when all is said and done, I just never felt that this film was firing on all four cylinders consistently enough and I found many of the characters to be underdeveloped, underwritten and therefore, both they, and the story, were never as interesting as they could have been. As I said in my summary, it is mildly engaging, but not much more than that.

Zach Braff's light-hearted directorial debut 'Garden State' was one of mixed feelings. Although the low budget comedy-drama may be the starting shot of a successful career, 'Garden State' left me feeling slightly disappointed, when I think about the movie that could have been.Andrew Largeman (Zach Braff) is a young man with a scarred past, who has numbed his problems with an always full medicine cabinet. As a kid, he paralysed his mother by pushing her over a dish washer. His father has always blamed Andrew, while he himself claims it was just due to the broken latch. He now returns to New Jersey for his mother's funeral. During his return, he develops a relationship with the spontaneous, talkative Sam (Natalie Portman).Sam is the most interesting character in the film, wherein Portman shows she is more than just a pretty face. She creates a layered character with a complicated but likable personality, whereas to my mind Braff's numbness and quirkiness is more difficult to like. Braff's directorial choices are certainly not bad for a first-timer. His style is effective in portraying the character quirks of Andrew. While a director like Kar Wai Wong often uses slow-motion shots, Braff sometimes focuses on Andrews character and speeds up everything around him. As to the film's script, there are bright moments, but unfortunately, sometimes it lapses into force-fed Hollywood romanticism.Nevertheless, I can appreciate the light-heartedness of the film and the "Graduatesque" relationship is interesting to an extent. However, the word 'forced' lingered in my head throughout the film. Granted, it is a good soundtrack, but the emotionality of the movie seems to force itself upon us by the use and timing of the songs.

This is typically the kind of film I despise, I call them Sundance film, they are the Canada Dry of art film, it looks like an art film, it smells like an art film but it's just another rubbish ROM com that wants really badly to be hip. It borrows a bit of the Wes Anderson aesthetics to be quirky (wow his jumper matches the sofa) but all the characters are clichés and lame, it wants desperately to be the document of a generation ( listen to the shins, it will save your life ermmmmmmm, it's not Bob Dylan or Public Enemy). A bit of cutesy folk there for emotion, some Coldplay (wow very marginal). It's contrived, cheesy and wants to be controversial (drugs! Great, the corporate lawyer that lives next to my flat takes drugs, and he's anything but cool, interesting or deep). And worst of all, that scene where Zack Braff (it's not a character really is it, it's him wanting the world to be miserable, the ultimate victim) wants to makes us cry using the brother that died when he was a kid, he feels guilty because he didn't save him, so right he's all messed up and all. Well it didn't happened to you, write it for a character, but not for lachrymal power. I felt truly disgusted by this scene, mostly because you can tell there's no ethics behind, no meaning, and Zack Braff not being a good drama actor makes it awkward. And casting Nathalie Portman so you can kiss the hot chick is very pathetic.