FOOL’S GOLD
“Fool’s Gold” directed by Andy Tennant and starring Kate Hudson and Mathew McConaughey is yet another adventure-treasure hunt film where the main character, Ben “Finn” Finnegan pursues his obsession with finding the legendary 18th century Spanish treasure that was lost at sea, throwing caution and everything else (including his marriage and all possessions) to the wind.
Considering that there is at least one such movie released a year, competition runs high and unlike most films in the genre, this one falls just short of its competitors. Yes, it is light and at times even funny but the storyline does not bring anything new to the table and sometimes, in spite of all the tricks, drags as if trying to hard to maintain the viewer’s interest. To be honest, the film follows in the same lines of most action-adventure movies of the last three decades with a soppy love story between the main characters as a subplot.
Speaking of characters, there lies another disappointment. While Kate Hudson as Tess delivers a pretty believable performance of an intelligent woman falling for a bad guy and forgetting her own goals caught up in the excitement of searching for treasures, Mathew McConaughey’s character, Finn, lacks such credibility. Here is a man of an undefined age with an aura of a bum whose ignorant-redneck-south Floridian accent made the hairs on the back of my neck rise each time he spoke. Besides, it was quite difficult to imagine that such a persona would possess any knowledge in the fields of history and archeology, much less deliver great lectures on the topic of an 18th century Spanish royal family and their enormous wealth.
Another mistake the producers made was casting a British actor (Ray Winston, who otherwise is a great performer) as your typical southern-spoken American. His ability to imitate the southern drawl is somewhat not up to scratch, which creates an effect of a rather unnatural accent.
Thus, if you are in the mood for a good action-adventure film, you may be left slightly dissatisfied with “Fool’s Gold”, unless you have absolutely no high expectations other than nearly two hours of mindless so-called entertainment.