It was really bad. Did such a disservice to a great book.

Casting - Great, except for Pierce Brosnan at Ron. Ron was supposed to be a labor union troublemaker from the 60's and 70's. T-shirt wearing, tatooed, east-ender. Instead we got old James Bond. Awful. Hellen Mirren and Ben Kingsley were great, though.

Writing/Direction - The script was too hard to follow. The mystery was so dumbed down from the book that it bore only a passing resemblance. They spent a good amount of time developing the characters and the setting, and then it was like the realized they only had 15 minutes left in the budget and said "lets wrap this up!" The result was confusion, abruptness, lack of connection to motives, and a general crappy job.

Overall, Columbus did a lazy, awful job. Probably killed the film franchise.

Interesting. I thought it was Ok but didn't read the book. I may have just based my reaction on Brosnan (who I wish I was) and Helen Mirren (who I've had the hots for since Excalibur). Yes I'm very old.