I'm a John Leguizamo fan but this one just fell kinda flat for me. It's partly based on John's own life, which becomes apparent because in the movie they have him being the star of such movies like CARLITO'S WAIT and EMPOWER.
No I didn't spell that wrong, they couldn't afford to license the posters I guess for the real movies CARLITO'S WAY and EMPIRE so they had to change the names... Or it was made consciously just to say that the main character is just ALMOST John Leguizamo himself but not exactly, either way it doesn't matter.
The life-story of "ALMOST John Leguizamo" Jesse simply is just not all that interesting, and it focuses too much on a love-story between him and RADHA MITCHELL.
Radha who I usually really like as well, is not that at all great this time. In fact I found her character incredibly annoying and the chemistry between the two weren't hitting off, and since she's such a crucial part of the story this inevitably is what makes this movie fail.
The movie often becomes tediously self indulgent at times as well.
It's a dramacomedy I guess, that's not particularly dramatic nor funny. Not even the stand up comedy scenes which have the hired audience laughing on cue are funny. Better luck next time.
