This movie doesn't just have echoes of the "Northern Exposure" TV series - it could have been a feature-length episode. Take a small Alaskan town full of kooky characters and transplant it - wandering moose and all - to Maine. Take a feisty female pilot (Janine Turner) and make her a feisty animal doctor who can fly helicopters. Your male lead, a slightly-ditzy doctor character (Rob Morrow) becomes a slightly-ditzy hardware store owner. For good measure, while you're in the largest state in the union, borrow from "Mystery, Alaska" the idea of the whole world coming to such a tiny town and overrunning it with a media frenzy. Only here you have the ex-President of the U.S. showing up instead of a pro hockey team.
Presumably, this was a vehicle for Ray Romano rather than for Hackman, who doesn't need it and almost sleepwalks through his role as the President. Hackman improves the tone of any movie just by being in it. Ray, meanwhile, well...he's Ray Romano. You keep expecting Brad Garrett to show up, or for Ray to slip over to his parents' house and discuss his campaign strategy.
Instead you get a very bland almost-two-hours where much is promised and little is delivered. Rip Torn plays a devious campaign manager for Hackman's character, but he never gets to do much deviousness. The plot kinda meanders along, much as life in a small town, but the comic potential of Hackman's big fish character adapting to such a setting, and in the rivalry between him and Romano in the mayoral race, is woefully underplayed and never exploited to the full. The other characters can do little to flesh out the story, so you're left with a very average and disappointing product. That isn't to say you couldn't do a lot worse, but this movie should not feature too high on any "must-see" lists.
Presumably, this was a vehicle for Ray Romano rather than for Hackman, who doesn't need it and almost sleepwalks through his role as the President. Hackman improves the tone of any movie just by being in it. Ray, meanwhile, well...he's Ray Romano. You keep expecting Brad Garrett to show up, or for Ray to slip over to his parents' house and discuss his campaign strategy.
Instead you get a very bland almost-two-hours where much is promised and little is delivered. Rip Torn plays a devious campaign manager for Hackman's character, but he never gets to do much deviousness. The plot kinda meanders along, much as life in a small town, but the comic potential of Hackman's big fish character adapting to such a setting, and in the rivalry between him and Romano in the mayoral race, is woefully underplayed and never exploited to the full. The other characters can do little to flesh out the story, so you're left with a very average and disappointing product. That isn't to say you couldn't do a lot worse, but this movie should not feature too high on any "must-see" lists.