Reese Witherspoon: 5 Awesome Performances And 5 That Sucked

4. Isabella Fields El-Ibrahimi - Rendition (2007)

The basic premise of Rendition: Anwar El-Ibrahimi (Omar Metwally) is an Egyptian citizen with a green card who's been living and working in the United States since he was 14 years old. He has a lovely American wife, Isabella (Witherspoon), a cute little six-year-old kid, and a baby on the way. He coaches his son's soccer team. He's a chemical engineer with a $200K salary and a nice house in the suburbs of Chicago. One day, on his way home from a business trip to South Africa, Anwar is taken aside by security at the airport and ushered away for questioning about his alleged involvement with a terrorist whose cell phone number has been traced making phone calls to his cell phone. How does Anwar explain this? Unfortunately for him, he can't. Witherspoon delivers another underwhelming performance that has less to do with her abilities and more to do with the dreary material. The actress is surprisingly lifeless. She customarily injects energy and spirit into her roles, but here, her performance feels tamped down. Rendition falters in its storytelling abilities, often biting off a little more than it can chew in terms of both plot and character. Witherspoon's performance as a pregnant and distraught wife, while engrossing, simply doesn€™t grab you as it should.