THE GOOD SHEPHERD

Yet another review that's taken me awhile to get to. "The Good Shepherd" is yet another film where the trailer makes the film seem better than it really is. Giving off tempos of a spy thriller like Matt Damon's previous films, "The Bourne Identity" and "The Bourne Supremacy", "The Good Shepherd" is more a look at the life of one man who got recruited for intelligence and then chose to remain in the field of intelligence, where anything can be sacrificed including his family.
The film flips between the past and the present much like an informant is on both sides of the law, living in crime while reporting to the law. The past becomes lost in this tango, losing any audience attention with the characters. Nobody ends up really caring about the family, Angelina Jolie seems to have been overcasted, she's got a fairly small role, more of a pretty face this time around.
Perhaps it would have been a better film had it been two, one focusing on the past, one on the present, or perhaps just one timeline. The mystery Damon's character has to solve in the present storyline is who betrayed his operation, but you figure it out fairly easily once a few clues are revealed.
Bottom line: if you go in expecting an thriller flick, you'll be disappointed, otherwise, one might be interested in this film.