After about 40 minutes, the phrase “Rashomon without the rape” came to mind. More eroticism could have been written in, in place of the stroboscopic flashback sequences, and the film would have kept the PG-13 rating and been improved overall. I have to question Ethan Hawke’s acting ability: he brought the same character to ‘Cedars as he did to Gattaca, and I can’t say I found him sympathetic or even likeable either time. Every other character is either shallowly despicable or simply shallow. The soundtrack was pretty good, and some of the sets and camera work were gorgeous – too bad they were edited to hell. I consistently found myself annoyed over changes of camera angle, or logical scenes broken up too quickly to catch the feel of a set in detail. Worth seeing once, but nothing will be lost in translation to video rental.