Valentine’s Day Not a Jolly Holiday
I’m not sure what there is to say about Valentine’s Day; the movie, not the holiday. As far as the latter is concerned I’ve never had much use for it, and while I admit in the past it was nice to receive flowers at work or at school overall the whole idea behind it has always been far too corporate for my tastes.
Bradley Cooper and Julia Roberts in New Line Cinema's Valentine's Day
Which I guess is what I can also say about the former. This Garry Marshall production, the easygoing director behind Beaches, Pretty Woman and The Princess Diaries, feels a bit like a movie conceived inside a corporate board room and not at the tip of screenwriter Katherine Fugate’s (The Prince & Me) pen. I got the feeling while watching it that New Line Cinema focused group the crap out of it, anything not receiving universal affirmation excised in order to make room for new scenes that didn’t tax a viewer’s noggin.
The funny thing is, thanks to a cast made up of heavyweight all-stars like Julia Roberts, Anne Hathaway, Shirley MacLaine, Jamie Foxx, Queen Latifah, Hector Elizondo, Kathy Bates and Jennifer Garner the movie is hardly a lost cause. Even better, unlike so many other romantic comedies this is one of the few of late that doesn’t actively hate women (like say the odious When in Rome or last year’s detestable Bride Wars), the movie having a genteel, lightly effervescent quality that’s oftentimes charming.
But even at just about two hours the darn thing is still far too long with entire subplots that add up to nothing. More or less revolving around a single Los Angeles flower shop trying to survive the Valentine’s holiday owned by a surprisingly delightful Ashton Kutcher, many of the tangential vignettes are shockingly close to pointless, particularly one featuring teenage lovebirds Taylors Swift and Lautner. Their romance is borderline embarrassing, neither youngster a strong enough actor to make their idiotic ramblings feel like anything other than an excuse to get a pair of pubescent pretty faces into the production on the premise teenage girls might be more likely to buy some tickets.
It doesn’t help that Marshall has lost any and all ability to pace his films. For those that thought his last couple features dragged (Georgia Rule and The Princess Diaries 2) they’re nothing compared to this. The tissue connecting one story to the next is stretched out to interminable lengths, and even when a piece works marvelously (like Roberts and Bradley Cooper making light conversation on an airplane or MacLaine and Elizondo confessing their gorgeously messy eternal love in a crowded cemetery) at times getting to those scenes is like wading through quick drying cement.
I have numerous other problems (like why the story’s estranged gay couple never kiss during reconciliation or why Jessica Alba sticks around to walk her dog and check into a hotel after she decides to avoid commitment) all of which do their part to make the movie a gigantic missed opportunity. Yet there is still enough here that works to make me wonder if I’m being a tiny bit dismissive. Hathaway has sublime chemistry with Topher Grace (the actor’s best performance since 2004’s In Good Company), while Jessica Biel proves once again she might just be one of the most woefully underrated actresses working in Hollywood today. I adored young Emma Roberts (Julia’s niece) in this, while every scene with 10-year-old Bryce Robinson brought a smile to my face so big I wondered if it would ever disappear.
Not that I had to wonder long. The film is just too slow and filled with too much mystifying pabulum for it to resonate. While it almost goes without saying a performer of the caliber of a Latifah or a Bates can generate a laugh in their sleep, the reason for their characters being a part of the proceedings is ephemeral at best and meaningless at worst. There’s so much needless filler slogging through it in order to get to the good stuff was sadly too much for me to bear, and like the holiday it purportedly celebrates Valentine’s Day is an odd waste of time I just can’t muster up the energy to love.
- Review reprinted courtesy of the SGN in Seattle
Film Rating: êê (out of 4)
