capsule : why is this movie three hours long ? because it's too stupid to know when to stop . the postman may be the single dumbest movie i've ever seen . not the worst -- i still leave that accolade to be divided between starship troopers and money train -- but by far the dumbest . it takes a situation that had plenty of possibilities , which are all better examined in the david brin novel that the postman has been sensessly cannibalized from , and turns them into an idiot's delight . people should be able to buy insulin along with their popcorn for this one , it's so saccharine and treacly . not too far into the future , america has been ravaged by a war which has shattered civilization . the exact details of this war are conveniently omitted -- i imagine they felt " it wasn't important " , or some other such lame writer's left-handed excuse . omitting critical detail is not the same thing as creative restraint , and in this movie they add up to glaring empty places in the story . wandering through the shattered landscape ( snore ) is a man with no name ( double snore ) who comes across the uniform and truck of a dead mailman . he's used to sleazing his way from one end of hell to the other , so he puts on the uniform ( hey , it's in pretty good shape for a guy who's been dead at least a decade ! ) and tries to scam whatever little pockets of civilization are left into offering him shelter , by pretending to be a letter carrier for the " restored united states of america " . we are supposed to believe that the movie is about how this drifted inspires people by his " example " . wrong : the movie is not about anything , because it's too busy drowning in jackass cliches and godawful writing to ever manage a statement of purpose . it's one part western , one part mad max and one part hollywood self-congratulatory sentimentalism , none of which works . it's also an ass- ( and bladder- ) breaking three hours . titanic , in comparison , felt half as long because it was so watchable and so swift on its feet . the postman is a lumbering , boneheaded wreck of a movie that doens't know when to lie down and give up . the silliness is just unstoppable . one painfully unfunny scene has costner's character trying to do shakespeare from memory ( and we learn , over and over and over again , that he can't do it without cue cards ) . another one has him doing his letter-carrying rounds on horseback , shot in such agonizing slow motion that we want to shout instructions at the projectionist . maybe when this is released on tape and in a deluxe cav letterboxed collector's edition laserdisc set ( as it inevitably will be ) , we can thumb the fast-forward and make up for costner's hamhandedness in the director's chair . monty python once had a recurring character they named d . p . gumby , an utter dimwit who approached everything from brain surgery to flower arranging with granite-jawed seriousness . watching the postman , i felt many associations could be drawn between mr . gumby and kevin costner as a filmmaker . costner is just so ploddingly , heart-rendingly , goddamned * earnest * in this movie -- both as an actor and as the creative mind behind it -- that he fails to notice he's making a complete and utter fool of himself . 
