I did not like the screen play in this one. Patrick Demsey plays a slick player who seems to have it all. They make it abundant clear that he is 'the man'. He gets all the girls and has the nicest car etc.. But there is one thing that he doesn't have. His best friend, played by Michelle Monaghan. They have been best friends since college and I could have guessed that they were going to end up together from the very beginning. When writing, one should not spoon feed the what's happening to the audience. I think they were lacking in the mysterious department. It's kind of like when a joke is made, and the audience can guess the punch line before it's even given.... It's not as funny. There were also some unnecessary elements that were adding to the script like when they talk about the Duke (this is the guy Demsey eventually steal his best friend back from) and they say that they have arrived at the castle. A girl says it's really big and the butler replies that it the smallest of the four, as they have one for every season. The castle wasn't that impressive so that tells me they didn't have enough money to rent a legit one. Also, they never show the other three so why bother? Another aspect I didn't like from the writing of this was the meeting and introducing of our duke character. This just got thrown on us out of no where. They sit down for 5 seconds and at dinner and then the best friend says that she is getting married to him. Very anticlimactic.
The Camera work here was average. I was not wowed because they didn't do anything industry changing, but it wasn't so awful that I couldn't see what was going on. There were close ups when needed and they kept there distance at times when needed. I liked the shot they did of Patrick walking through the park by himself. He had just lost her and so he went off to think to himself. They kept their distance here and I think that this exemplified his inner-thought well.
The acting was a bit sub-par for me. I thought that Patrick played a good "player" but when it came to his soft side, it felt a little weak. It seemed really fake when he tried to win over his best friend from the Duke. He said "I love you" and I cringed. Michelle didn't have any sophistication to her character. This performance was waaay too generic. The character's personality was not fleshed out at all and that is partly her fault and partly the writers fault.
If you look at the pictures below, you will see why I did not enjoy the camera work that much. The one on the right shows the couple together, and you can hear what they are saying, but I would have liked to have seen it a little more up close and personal to feel like I was a part of the conversation. The same goes for the one on the bottom. Let us be a part of the action!!
So the camera work was adequate, but nothing special.
Overall I give this movie exactly what it earned, which is one star out of 5. Don't bother.
I agree with you on your review. I remember seeing this movie a while ago and not having any interest in seeing it again. The plot was too cliché and the movie was anticlimactic. It is interesting how you analyzed the cinematic elements. I really like how you compared the distance shot of Patrick Dempsey's walk to his inner thoughts. I also enjoyed the comment you made about the movie having unnecessary commentary, like Duke's castle. This was a very good and thorough review.
ReplyDeleteInteresting points; I think you hit most of the common criticism of "bad" films--bad writing, bad acting, bad directing, predictable story, etc. Nice job.
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