'Shepherd' just not too intriguing

0 Comments | Philadelphia Daily News, December, 2006 | by GARY THOMPSON

Among the year-end releases there's always at least one movie that, in the holiday spirit, looks like it's spent too much time at the buffet table. This year's example is "The Good Shepherd," Robert De Niro's fictionalized account of the CIA's formative years, a three-hour movie about intrigue that stops being intriguing after about two hours.

"Shepherd" stars Matt Damon as a Edward Wilson, an old-money Ivy Leaguer and secret-handshake frat guy recruited after WWII to join the secret intelligence agency that would become the CIA (portrayed in the movie as the quintessential WASP fraternity). He's posted to Europe, where he lays the foundation for the Cold War's spy vs. spy culture, and even meets the Soviet adversary with whom he will match wits over the next few decades....