MOVIE REVIEW

Taken from a personal-growth book by Dan Millman, the film battles the blah-blah and blahs.

By Robert Abele, Special to The Times

Like a blip in a genre timeline that extends from "Grass-hoppah" through "wax on, wax off" and Morrie-filled Tuesdays, the sage-elder/wayward-charge saga "Peaceful Warrior" aims for inspirational highs but mostly feels like a self-help book read aloud by actors.

It is, actually, based on a 1980 "personal growth" memoir by Dan Millman, who onscreen — as played by Scott Mechlowicz — starts out a believably cocky, Olympics-driven college gymnast with nagging nightmares about shattered dreams. Enter Socrates (Nick Nolte), a mystical, white-haired gas station attendant and Zen drill instructor who, between fill-ups, puts the resistant Dan on the path to inner strength with dialogue composed almost entirely of such aphorisms as "You can live a whole lifetime without ever being awake" and metaphors for clearing one's mind such as "Take out the trash." Needless to say, he's not a life-of-the-party type.

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Director Victor Salva — who most recently trafficked in more gruesome life-preservation lessons on the "Jeepers Creepers" films — displays a capably slick hand and a surer touch stylizing Dan's exploits on gym rings and the supernatural way the is-he-real-or-isn't-he Socrates messes with Dan's mind. But ultimately the overall message is like a towering wave, washing out any of this comeback saga's potential drama.

For a movie committed to the notion of living life with a shimmering consciousness, "Peaceful Warrior" oddly lacks those eccentric details of everyday humanity that make stories of any stripe ring true. Considering Socrates' fix-it power, though, it may do wonders for the image of garage mechanics.

*

'Peaceful Warrior'

MPAA rating: PG-13 for sensuality, sex references and accident scenes

A Lionsgate release. Director Victor Salva. Screenplay Kevin Bernhardt. Based on the book "Way of the Peaceful Warrior" by Dan Millman. Running time: 2 hours.

In general release.