YMMV / Sahara (2005)

• Anvilicious: For the biggest part, the movie does a good job conveying the Green Aesop by just showing the situation through the eyes of the characters. But they still felt the need to hammer it home with the words of the local African dictator.
  Kazim: Don't worry. It's Africa. Nobody cares about Africa.
• Complete Monster: Brigadier General Zateb Kazim is a warlord who rules half of Mali, maintaining an iron grip on his territory at the expense of his people. When his lands experience a plague, Kazim tries to block UN humanitarian aid to his territory so they do not discover the source of the plague is Kazim himself, who is allowing the water to be contaminated with toxins for the profits he gains from the corporation dumping the toxins. Kazim uses slave labor in the plant and has no issue if the plant is destroyed with the workers in it to cover up his crimes. Ruthless and greedy, Kazim will stop at nothing to take control of Mali, even if he allows thousands of civilians to die so he can grow wealthier.
• Moment of Awesome: Dirk after MacGyvering a means of transportation out of a crashed plane, complete with awesome soundtrack and desert scenery.
• Moral Event Horizon: When Kazim kills Frank.
• Questionable Casting: Al Giordino is described in the books as a swarthy Italian with curly black hair and a bushy mustache. The role went to pale midwesterner Steve Zahn.
  • Word of God states in one of the DVD extras that the filmmakers decided to put more emphasis on the comedy relief aspects of the character because there isn't an actor alive who fit close enough to Giordino's description in the books and that this decision had the support of the original book's author.
• Special Effect Failure: During the boat chase scene, the boat's windshield is shot out. Multiple times.

---