**The Good**:

+ Features a good amount of exciting action scenes that keep you watching until the end.
+ The somewhat realistic take on treasure hunting makes this film stand out from its brothers and sisters.
+ **Matthew McConaughey** proves he does make a good action star.
+ The dialogue features some genuinely memorable and hilarious lines.

**The Bad**:

- The story as a whole is the biggest criminal here. The two intertwining story-lines never really interact well together and the main story of the lost civil war ship is quickly side-lined. The first half of the movie doesn't really move the plot forward at all until some convenient and lazy writing decisions suddenly make both plots leap a mile or two forward.
- The movie lacks the flow of adventure that makes films such as the _Indiana Jones_-franchise so enjoyable.
- The cast isn't very believable - McCounaghey and Zahn never make for believable treasure hunters, even if they are good action stars. Penelope Cruz just hangs around, is offensively one-dimensional, and has very little purpose in the story.
- The bad guys aren't particularly interesting. They show up in the middle of the story, do some bad stuff with unclear motives, and are defeated by our heroes.
- **Steve Zahn** has his moments, but he is mostly annoying.

**Verdict**:

_Sahara_ could have been the next big adventure movie - but instead it's an unoriginal, boring and not very exciting attempt at a Indy rip-off.

Decent watch, might watch again, but can't recommend unless you're running out of things to watch or are an action archaeology fan.

This was a weird attempt created a 2005 version of Indiana Jones, or, since this is in Africa, Alex Quartermaine with Matthew McConaughey, of all people. I'm not aware of Matthew McConaughey or Steve Zahn being big action stars, but they surprisingly manage to handle their own, even if it isn't always believeable. Rainn Wilson and Penelope Cruz get in on the action as well....if that helps.

The premise is a little interesting: they're looking for a U.S. Confederate boat in Africa. Because it's not interesting enough on it's own, Penelope Cruz is a doctor trying to stop a plague coming from a war-torn country. It all feels a like ridiculously improbable things happening in a world that is far too realistic rather than a world created of fiction that houses an incredible story.

The movie is heavy with plot armor, despite any cleverness the characters have.

It's fine to watch, but there has to be something else that you can watch that is likely going to be better.

Words like "Literary work" and "Clive Cussler" really shouldn't be in the same sentence.

Hey...chill...I love Clive Cussler, I honestly do. In fact I'll put him in the same league as Elmore Leonard and Louis L'Amour and I will put them in the same league as Dumas and Doyle.

They all write pulp fiction, adventure, crime, mystery, horror, whatever, they all fall under the title "pulp" and I can admit that I eat them whole, without swallowing...

...and without the need to call them "Literary" in an effort to save face.

I have the academic degrees somewhere in a box, the intellectual prowess, and a library with enough classics and heady works of history and philosophy to be able to openly display writers like Chris Claremont, Marv Wolfman, and Timothy Zane to not have to call his work "Literature." I will however call it "Adventure" I will call it "Fun" and what should be most important to any writer or film maker..."Entertaining." It doesn't have to follow the book. Jackie Brown was a far cry from Rum punch and they were both a lot of fun to watch and read.

So Sahara isn't like the novel.

It is an Action-Adventure-Comedy. That means it is everything that pulp should be, it is everything that movies should be...

In fact it is the kind of film that the critics would have loved in the Golden Age of Hollywood.