If "Reign Over Me" is any indication, the quest to write the "great American 9/11 movie" has a ways to go. After "Flight 93" and "World Trade Center" focused on specific acts of American heroism surrounding the event, "Reign Over Me" attempts to cast 9/11's effects on a more personal level.

New York dentist Alan Johnson (Don Cheadle) spots his old college roommate, Charlie Fineman (Adam Sandler), on the street and flags him down. However, Charlie's not well, having lost his family in the 9/11 attacks. In fact, Charlie's a few fries short of a happy meal. The role represents Sandler's most ambitious "assault on serious acting" to date, but it's curious and perhaps instructive that his only apparent option to cross the river between the realms of comedic and serious acting is to buy a ticket on the good ship "Daft." One need only revisit "Punch Drunk Love" for further evidence.

The other thing this movie has going for it is Don Cheadle. That's right: Don Cheadle, perhaps best known for being miscast in some baffling NFL ads a couple years ago, and then publicly mocked for it later by the same ad agency. Oh, that and "Hotel Rwanda." A key early detail we learn about his character is that he's irresistible to women. Because when I think "irresistible to women," I think "Don Cheadle." But I digress.

Anyway, Alan and Charlie reconnect and we follow Charlie's journey from the first stage of grief, denial, to the second stage, anger. This journey has many steps. And takes two hours. And contains few, if any, surprises. Gee, do you think Charlie will work his way to some level of catharsis? Do you think Alan will spend much of the movie helping Charlie, only to discover in the end that Charlie's helped him in equal measure?

Further straining the movie's credibility is the fact that the New York City of "Reign Over Me" would be better named "The City of Amazing Coincidences." How many people live in New York? 20 million? Alan's two chance encounters with Charlie to start the movie are unlikely enough, but a later chance encounter in a therapist's office is such a forehead-slapper that you're tempted to give up on the movie then and there.

That said, the movie does manage to achieve some genuine emotional moments that will quiet most theaters, unless it's the theater in which Ann Coulter happens to be sitting. In that case, it'll be tough to concentrate as she laughs derisively at the 9/11 victim's pain, causing other people in the audience to turn around and stare at her Adam's apple and noticeable erection. But again, I digress.