.jeri.

I'm not sure how Sherman's March ended up in my queue. Since I hadn't heard of it, I'm assuming it must have been based on someone's recommendation. The premise has a lot of promise, because it starts off as a documentarian's attempt to study the lasting effects of General Sherman's march, but becomes a study of the women that infatuate the documentarian as he traces the general's steps.

As it turns out, his girlfriend has recently left him (Ross), and he and the people who know him seem determined that he needs to meet a girl before it's too late. Unfortunately, his self-doubt and circumstances coincide to leave him unlucky in love most of the time. But, as he travels across the country, he meets all sorts of interesting people.

I love how the documentary keeps leading to new women who have new passions in life, and how he becomes obsessed with each one of them. There are so many possibilities, all of which he is open to exploring. The girls he finds are all sure of themselves, and perhaps his unsureness in himself that turns them away from him. From the pretty girl with the beautiful voice who turns out to be a strict Mormon to the girl who wants to be an actress whose exploits lead Ross to a conversation with a Burt Reynolds double, the women are varied, but all are beautiful and interesting in their own ways. Unfortunately, our guy just can't get a break.

The movie does go at a rather slow pace. It keeps coming back to the history of General Sherman, but those moments are few and far between. The movie keeps getting sidetracked, and it becomes about something completely different than what Ross set out to do. In some ways, he does compare the scars of the South with his own life, but the parallels are only lightly alluded to, and it would have been nice to see a connection between the originally intended material with the story of Ross and the girls.

Also, I think for the story of Ross to work, I would have liked to see more of a growth in his own character. It seems like he keeps repeating the same patterns and may not be learning from his experiences, although he does seem to hit on a less eccentric girl towards the end. That, combined with the slowness do make the movie somewhat of a disappointment, but the various locations and interesting people Ross encounters did make it worth the watch for me.