So there we were, waiting for our friend Anthony to get there so we could see a movie (it didn't really matter which one because we were going to heartlessly mock it regardless). We were all up for Book of Eli until we found out the next showing was in four hours. The only other girl in our group and I convinced the rest of the guys to go see Valentine's Day, seeing as it was the next one playing. I had hopes! The movie follows about eight hundred faces you've seen a million times before as they interact in every possible way, and I usually like those. It looked sort of like "Love, Actually" but in L.A.
These hopes were totally unjustified. Sure, there was a scene with someone running to the airport to stop someone else from leaving for another someone, and the Clerk Who Has To Delay The Runner To Cause Dramatic Tension even made a self-conscious comment, meaning that the writers KNEW they were being cliche and thought they could get away with it by pretending it was ironic.
But the lovesick young boy had no charming British accent! No crush his own age (Jennifer Garner's elementary school teacher character, you tried to brush it off as charming and innocent but you know you were a little creeped out! A little?) I wish Hollywood would drop the child-actor obsession. I guess they have to get practice somehow but hey, my elementary school put on plays about the sea, the gold rush, and the rainforest. Anyway, after some not-adorable, cringe-inducing child acting from the otherwise adorable eight year olds, there was a scene where Brad Pitt's football star bashes George Lopez's florist van from behind. The next scene we see him in, he's announcing he's gay at a press conference where everyone only wants to know if he's going to retire. He wants more time to have a family, so-- Nope! He's staying in the game! Makes perfect sense! The only conclusion I could draw was that George Lopez turned him gay and addled his brain with love. And for a movie that is perfectly fine with showing EIGHT THOUSAND mushy scenes of heterosexual couples, they sure held back on the one homosexual relationship. In the the only scene of them together, Bradley Cooper pats Pitt's head in what could be father-son affection.
I guess I should mention the Taylors, Swift and Lautner, who performed their one-sided characters (ditz and jock) satisfactorily in their three minutes of allotted screen time.
That's not to say it had no redeeming qualities whatsoever; the scenes with Anne Hathaway as a phone sex operator had us all quoting out of the theater. And it was pretty cool seeing familiar buildings and landmarks-- the camera panning over the Bienvenido Gustavo poster on the Walt Disney Concert Hall made me smile. But overall, it felt like the movie was running on a checklist of things people who go to chick flicks expect to see: Rude waiter? Check. Someone with a thick accent put in only for comedy? Check. Reference to the black character as chocolate? Check.
Hysterical, neurotic Type-A female character? Check. Queen Latifah owning everyone? Check. Sugary music playing when one character realizes they love another character while talking to a stranger? Check. Omnipresent narrator providing tired quotes and cheesy lines? Check. It's not exactly groundbreaking, but then again I'm pretty sure it wasn't intended to be.
No comments:
Post a Comment