Movie review - "Silver City" (2004) **1/2

John Sayles movies are always worth watching and for the most part this is an engrossing combination of detective film and political satire, as a rumpled investigator (Danny Huston) looks into a corpse that has been fished out of the river by a governor candidate (Chris Cooper). Huston is like an aging shaggy dog, an interesting type of detective, cheerful and a bit incompetent; Cooper is hilarous as the well meaning dimwit. There are also entertaining cameos from actors like Richard Dreyfuss, Billy Zane, Thora Birtch, etc. Around the half way point the film becomes a bit muddled with the points it seems it wants to make - the story lacks drive, and the big secret isn't really enough of a secret to power the film. Like most of Sayles movies, there's a down beat ending.