I attempted to disregard the bad reviews that this film received online and open-mindedly gave it a try anyway.  Sadly, I’ve found myself at the same conclusion as the majority on this one; it really just is not good.

Based loosely on real events from history, the premise seemed promising – three entrepreneurs, led by schemer Curtis Prentiss (Billy Crudup), set out to engineer and market a “rocket belt” which would allow humans to fly, or at least somewhat hover above the ground for short distances.  However, financial setbacks and technical difficulties as well as struggles of companionship and compromise lead them to deceit and betrayal as their plan quickly disassembles (and their minds quickly follow).  This is about all I can say about the plot, because it is about all that actually happens in the movie – an aimless array of events leading to nothing in particular.

The films leading actors are usually not a group to disappoint, but Paul Giamatti‘s goofy moustache and select few funny one-liners were not enough to save my interest.  Kristen Wiig was thoroughly annoying as usual (the woman simply cannot act in any sort of serious role, yet she has never once been funny to me), and her role in Pretty Bird seemed like an obsolete afterthought – simply a way to throw a bigger name love interest into the mix for media attention (which it appears the film still failed to receive).

Two good connections did surface as a result of these otherwise wasted hours of my life, the first being a realization that True Blood‘s evilest-of-all-evil vampires, Russell (Denis O’Hare, who played a semi-evil corporate leader in Pretty Bird), was actually Albert, the guardian of the infinite abyss, in one of my all time favorite movies, Garden State.  The second was the way I kept imagining Kenny, the third entrepreneur played by David Hornsby, as his character Rickety Cricket from It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia.  As you can see, the entertainment quality of this film was quite limited.

If you’d like to watch generally good actors embarrass themselves in a poorly executed, boring, directionless movie, then Pretty Bird is certainly for you.