I love Don Cheadle, I really do, but his new movie The Traitor seems so generic as to be almost impossible to distinguish from the dozen or so other espionage movies that have come out in the last few years. Just look at the poster at right- if you just glanced at it, wouldn't you think you'd seen the movie already?

Unfortunately the new trailer, available at Apple.com, doesn't do much to make the movie look like anything special. Cheadle plays a secret U.S. special operations agent whose motives come into question once an FBI agent (Guy Pearce) seemingly links him to terrorist events all over the globe. Judging from the trailer, the only guy on Cheadle's side is Jeff Daniels, but he's not even mentioned in the plot description, so I have no clue what his character is up to.

Meh and double meh. The movie comes out at the tail end of August, which is generally regarded as summer's version of a dumping ground. The movie might have a shot at finding an audience, but not with a trailer like this, which makes it look like Vantage Point without even the hokey gimmick going for it.