NO STRINGS ATTACHED (Ivan Reitman)

-

NO STRINGS ATTACHED is another cliched-ridden Hollywood romcom flick salvaged only by its two charming leads. The script gets real compelling when it wants to, and utterly stomach-churning corny during unguarded moments. Kutcher's line in the ending scene is unforgivable.

But at least there's a new take on modern relationships, or does it seem fresh only because Natalie Portman acts so well that you sympathize with everything she is going through?

On a sidenote, Portman never looked sexier onscreen. 

Happy guy meets assertive girl and they decide to become fuck buddies. Everything goes so well until they fall for each other, and assertive girl maintains her thick overcoat of emotional distance. Or does she?

Basically we watch this types of movies to escape. NO STRINGS ATTACHED is ridiculously funny I laughed so loud several times. I could not believe the guy who gave us ROAD TRIP and GHOSTBUSTERS directed a romcom. Ivan Reitman presents his two leads with such chemistry and emotional attachment that they're irresistible onscreen. In the hands of an amateur, this film would really suck. 

The cliches are there. You have your stock characters that you don't really need (Greta Gerwig deserves better than this!) and then there's a predictable sequence of events. Some events are preposterous even. Kevin Kline? Sure he's hilarious here, but dating his son's ex?

What makes one attached to NO STRINGS ATTACHED is the anticipation that Kutcher and Portman will end up together, and they do (like you didn't know). But you want to be with them every step of the way anyway. 

My favorite scene: Natalie Portman eating a box of donuts, driving, crying, and listening to Leona Lewis. That was just pathetic, and downright funny.

I loved the film for all its silliness, but it doesn't mean I'm tolerating the romcom formula from which this movie heavily relies on. 

RATING: 3/5






Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

TUHOG (Jeffrey Jeturian)

-
Image
Film within a film-structured movies are always interesting watch. Not only do they provide a much-needed deconstruction of form and content of cinema itself, but also that much-needed emotional punch a cinephile would surely love.  Like in BAD EDUCATION (Almodovar, 2004), we witness the characters tell the back story via montage, as if we are part of the cast of characters watching an actual movie. The form was successful in evoking pain and regret, and also of empathy. In TUHOG, Jeffrey Jeturian and screenwriter Bing Lao tackles sensational media in the Philippines, especially in cinema. The film opens as a film producer hears a pitch for a possible movie- a story of a grandfather who rapes his own granddaughter.  The director of the film soon after visits the victim of the crime, Floring (Ina Raymundo). Coercing both she and her mother, Perla (Irma Adlawan) to sell them the movie rights to their story, we witness as exploitation cinema unfolds. To think of it, capitalizing on ta
Read more

ANINO SA LIKOD NG BUWAN (Jun Lana, 2015)

-
Image
* English title "Shadow behind the Moon" The best term to describe Jun Lana's latest film would be a cinematic charade- a game of identities, of motives, of suppressed passions, and of uncertainty. Or the film equivalent of a Russian doll, if you will. "Anino sa Likod ng Buwan" only has three characters- husband and wife Nando (Anthony Falcon) and Emma (LJ Reyes) and military man Joel (Luis Alandy). What started as a seemingly routine banter among friends gradually and intensely escalated into an examination of society, where the definition of immorality is blurred during a time of insurgency.  And in fact, the film does discuss the subject of immorality from various paradigms. When does adultery become acceptable, and to whom? Is sexual liberation more heinous than murder? Why is immorality always a double standard? The film plays out the ideas in endless games. Or are they really games at all? Lana could have stopped there, but he didn'
Read more

A study of spaces in Nawapol Thamrongrattanarit's 'Happy Old Year'

-
Image
Space is both an overarching theme and visual signifier in Nawapol Thamrongrattanarit's Happy Old Year . Its protagonist, Jean (Chutimon Chuengcharoensukying) comes home from a lengthy stay abroad, determined to declutter her life, and along with it, old things that belong to a past she is desperately running away from. As we watch Jean plan the redesign of their family house into a more spacious and minimalist residential office, we also witness the transformation of the persons that inhabit the house, as well as their connection to other people, most of them absent from the frame. Jean the destroyer Millennials have often been criticized for being rash with their actions, and for having their way, no matter what. The filmmaker, a millennial himself, understands this stigma, and subliminally argues that millennials are the way they are because of a multitude of factors: rising cost of living, the evolution of discourse as a result of technology (such as film streaming se
Read more