Showing posts with label donald petrie. Show all posts
Showing posts with label donald petrie. Show all posts

Wednesday, June 20, 2007

Speaking of weak rom-coms: HOW TO LOSE A GUY IN TEN DAYS

This limp and lifeless movie comes as a disappointment given that it was directed by Donald "Miss Congeniality" Petrie and co-scripted by Burr "Igby Goes Down" Steers. Matthew McConaughey and Kate Hudson play New Yorkers who, for reasons of Wildean subtlety, have to make the other love them/dump them within ten days. She annoys him; he refuses to dump her; they fall in love; they find out that they were set up; they break-up; they make-up. The humour is scarce despite bit parts for Adam Goldberg and Bebe Newirth. The romance falls flat, highlighting the fact that while Sarah Jessica Parker may be irritating there's a certain role that she does best. Overall, not even one for DVD.

HOW TO LOSE A GUY IN TEN DAYS was released in 2003 and is available on DVD.

Tuesday, July 04, 2006

JUST MY LUCK - In which we are asked to believe that McFly are the hottest rock band in the universe

JUST MY LUCK is a weak romantic-comedy vehicle for Lindsay Lohan. The set-up is simple. Li-Lo plays a girl who has literally lived a charmed life. One day, at a masquerade ball, she kisses a guy who has been cursed with bad luck all his life. With that kiss, their fortunes change. The guy - played by Chris Pine (Anne Hathaway's squeeze in Princess Diaries 2) - becomes super lucky and Li-Lo becomes a loser. The movie then predictably follows the two of them as they fall in love with each other. That's it. Now, I'm not against the odd goof-ball teen flick that relies on an unbelievable premise. After all, I really liked She's The Man. But JUST MY LUCK fails on a number of levels. The movie contains not one single laugh, and depite being directed by the same guy who gave us Miss Congeniality, entirely fails to deliver a similar feel-good factor. I don't think the actors are at fault here - although the movie is stocked with more than its fair share of plastic OC rejects. Rather the mechanical grinding through the formula gives the whole production a rather sterile feel. The soul-less quality is magnified by the fact that the flick is a shameless merchandising tool for everything from the Hard Rock cafe to Tide washing up powder. And the biggest marketing ploy of all involves making Li-Lo's boyfriend the manager of, I kid you not, McFly. Frankly, it wasn't the fortune-changing-through-kissing plot line that had me incredulous so much as being asked to believe that McFly were about to kick off the greatest British invasion since The Beatles.

To summarise: you should not watch this movie unless you are a fan of McFly. In which case, you deserve what you get.

JUST MY LUCK is on release in the US, Australia and UK. It hits France on July 5th 2006, and Germany and Austria on August 17th.