What
would the summer movie season be without a romantic comedy starring Julia Roberts?
Remember Runaway Bride? While I liked Ameriaca's Sweethearts slightly more than
that picture, I wouldn't call this a very good movie.
As
written by Peter Tolan and co-star Billy Crystal, America's Sweethearts is a mediocre
satire on the film industry. Taking a cue from much better movies (see The Player,
The Big Picture, Soap Dish, or even the less than stellar Notting Hill also starring
Julia Roberts), America's Sweethearts is also a love story, and a pretty boring
one at that. Gwen Harrison and Eddie Thomas (Catherine Zeta-Jones and John Cusack)
are a famous movie screen couple who's turbulent off screen relationship hits
a brick wall. It couldn't happen at a worse time, because they have a movie to
promote. With the aid of Gwen's sister/assistant Kiki (Julia Roberts), and a frantic
PR guy (Billy Crystal), things might just work out for the best. While all of
this frantic stuff is taking place, a new relationship blossoms between two of
the film's key players.
What's
most sad about America's Sweethearts is how hard these attractive actors struggle
to make this material work. It never really does. Julia Roberts once again shows
off that million dollar smile. She's charming and at ease but has nothing to work
with. John Cusack is completely charismatic as the sympathetic love interest.
This
guy has come along way from Better Off Dead. Aside from Zorro and Traffic, I haven't
liked Catherine Zeta-Jones' work in a film. That still hasn't changed. Although
she is perfectly annoying in America's Sweethearts, I just couldn't get into her.
Crystal is nothing special here. As was the case in Analyze This, he just seems
to be on cruise control. It's the supporting cast that I really enjoyed. Alan
Arkin shows up as a sort of spiritual advisor and he's absolutely hilarious. Even
better is a completely eccentric Christopher Walken as the director of the movie
within a movie.
I
also enjoyed Seth Green as Crystal's assistant, and a manic Stanley Tucci as a
studio head. The most annoying of the supporting players is easily Hank Azaria
as Gwen's Spanish lover. This is an over the top, one note performance that became
tiresome after about two minutes.
Some
of the jokes dealing with the film industry worked but most didn't. As fate would
have it, there's even a gag in the film that uses Salt Lake City as a punchline.
In fact, the biggest laugh didn't come during the film but rather as the movie
was just about to start, as a rather flatulent theater patron let one go right
as the final trailer ended. It was quite immature but got an immediate response
nonetheless.
The
climax of the picture seems as if it might be inspired but then fizzles out. The
love story is strictly routine. We all know who's going to get together about
twenty minutes into the movie. This is awfully clumsy storytelling. And while
America's Sweethearts usually doesn't work, I didn't really loathe it. It has
light moments and an extremely attractive cast. For these reasons alone, I can't
trash the picture. You could do a lot worse than America's Sweethearts, but then
you could do a lot better as well.
