Intoxicating Goodwin Rises to the Challenge
Can one performance save an entire movie? That’s the question posed by the new ensemble romantic comedy He’s Just Not That Into You. Based on the fairly insipid book by one-time “Sex and the City” staff writers Greg Behrendt and Liz Tuccillo, this movie is about as crassly materialistic and senseless as these things get. It is pompous and full of itself, relying upon garbage trucks full of coincidence and cliché in order to get its full compliment of participants even close to being on the same page.
Justin Long and Ginnfer Goodwin in New Line Cinemas' He's Just Not That Into You
Yet the movie has moments of pure bliss and shockingly winning insight. There are little scenes that come alive and actually moved me at their best, made me think a little at their very worst, two things I’ll take from a motion picture any day of the week. Yes what it says about relationships is cloying, heavy-handed and juvenile, but every now and then it lucks into something wonderful, a cast of heavyweights (including Jennifer Aniston, Drew Barrymore, Kris Kristofferson, Scarlett Johansson, Justin Long, Bradley Cooper, Kevin Connolly, Luis Guzmán and Oscar-winners Jennifer Connelly and Ben Affleck) raising even the dullest and most inane moments to a level they never would have dreamt of obtaining otherwise.
Then there is the wildcard. Her name is Ginnifer Goodwin and she is, without a doubt, a revelation. I've liked her in almost everything I've seen her in (Mona Lisa Smile and Walk the Line in particular, although I also hear she’s outstanding in HBO’s “Big Love”) and I've considered her an underrated talent for quite some time. But what she manages to do with this is something else entirely. The young actress completely took my breath away, her scenes with Long as blissful and wondrous as any rom-com moments I've seen in ages, at least since Barrymore and Hugh Grant lit up the screen in Music and Lyrics.
What I liked best was just how downright unlikable and scary she was willing to make her sad-sack Miss Lonely Hearts appear and be. She becomes, at times, something of an obsessive stalker, and watching her descend into such outright body-aching neediness kind of broke my heart.
Yet there is a winsome luster to Goodwin that just crashes right through all that sadness and pain. She's almost like a silly, overly-emotional second cousin to Sally Hawkins’ Poppy from Mike Leigh’s Happy-Go-Lucky, and where some will find her a tad annoying for my part I found I couldn't take my eyes off the woman. In some small way I found I related to her, Goodwin making me smile and sending me out of the theater feeling better about things then I ever probably would normally have thus giving me a quandary I’m just not entirely sure what to do with.
The truth of the matter is He’s Just Not That Into You is a bit of a dog. Its tangents cover the gamut of infidelity, computer dating, unrequited lust, friends-with-benefits, marrying for the wrong reasons, familial strife and fear of commitment. It has blonde-haired vixens nakedly throwing themselves at unhappily married men, insecure intellectuals getting advice from stereotypically queeny homosexuals, a trio of sisters rubbing it into the face of their unmarried eldest sibling and enough John Hughes references to fill an entire shoebox with note cards counting them all.
Throw in chapter breaks with faux “real people” waxing poetic about the ups and downs of romance and the whole thing plays like a multi-character When Harry Met Sally… crossed with Crash only made by a director, Ken Kwapis, with nowhere near the talent or restraint of Rob Reiner (the old Rob Reiner, not the one of the past decade who has seemingly forgotten everything that once made him matter) or – love him or hate him – Paul Haggis. This is, after all, the guy who made License to Wed, a truly unfunny train wreck I still don’t think I’ve ever quite been able to block from my brainpan.
Be that as it may, thanks to Goodwin (with no small assist to Long, who is nearly equally wonderful), and because of a few great moments of extreme insight I couldn’t help but agree with, there is something going on here I just can’t explain. With every fiber of my being telling me I’m being too much of a pushover, I’m going to give He’s Just Not That Into You a gentle pass coupled with a slight recommendation. It is the exception to the rule, proving that even bad movies can offer up just enough of merit and wonderment to make them, not just worthwhile, but for the romantically inclined in particular very nearly essential.
Film Rating: êê1/2 (out of 4)
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