He’s Just Not That Into You (2009)
He’s Just Not That Into You(USA) Directed by Ken Kwapis. Written by Abby Kohn; Marc Silverstein. Starring Jennifer Aniston; Ginniffer Goodwin; Kevin Connolly; Justin Long; Ben Affleck; Drew Barrymore; Jennifer Connelly; Scarlett Johansson; Bradley Cooper
Directed by Ken Kwapis, the film is based on a self-help book He’s Just Not That Into You: The No Excuses Truth To Understanding Guysby Greg Behrendt and Liz Tuccillo. Set in Baltimore (though it feels like a generic anywhere U.S.A.), on the surface this has all the markings of another entry into the never-ending parade of Hollywood dreck. The result is something marginally better. Upon further examination, the main premise is actually a pretty good one - the idea being that women are overly hopeful about, and supportive of one another when it comes to, dating. The basic notion is that women look for any sign to think that men are into them, and want to believe that on the whole men are well-intentioned and forthright when it comes to affairs of the heart. There are most definitely some overly broad generalizations at work here that, depending on one’s perspective, could be viewed as sexist, or simply as further evidence that women are on the whole better, more emotionally generous people, although a lot of the observational humor is based in truth. Somewhat miraculously, the film almost manages to transcend its contrived genre limits and become something more. Almost. One major obstacle to those ends is that there are simply too many lead characters. Nine in all, played by Ginnifer Goodwin as Gigi, a neurotic single continually misreading signals from men, who goes out on a blind date with Conor (Kevin Connolly), a realtor in love with indifferent yoga instructor Anna (Scarlett Johansson). Anna falls for Ben (Bradley Cooper) who’s married to Jamie (Jennifer Connelly). Ben’s friend Neil (Ben Affleck) lives happily with Beth (Jennifer Aniston), who works in advertising with Gigi and Jamie, and is semi-obsessed with the renovations on her and Ben’s new home. Neil loves Beth, but refuses to commit to getting married. Alex (Justin Long), a restaurant manager, and Conor’s roommate, meets Gigi as she is stalking Conor, and tries to help her with her problems with men. Drew Barrymore (who also produces) is Mary, who is recommended to Conor by Anna to assist him by advertising to gay clients to build his business. Deep breath. Though the cast is a good one, and certainly has a lot going for it in the looks department, it’s impossible to empathize with this many people. As is, the film is over two hours long and with this many leads it could have easily been longer. It seems like a logical solution would’ve been to cut down to six people we might have gotten to know better (Drew Barrymore’s Anna seems particularly superfluous). One of the other missteps is that although there are a lot of basic truisms here about gender differences and dating rituals (some of them might even be uncomfortable for certain audience members in shaky relationships) the film pushes it a little too far. These are, on the whole, well-educated, middle-upper-middle class people after all, and some of the things Ginnifer Goodwin’s character says and does stretch the limits of believability (the degree of her ineptitude could, again, be interpreted by some as having sexist undertones). And here we get to the heart of the trouble with having so many major characters, and trying to squeeze in bits of information about them all into the mix - you wind up with sketches instead of fully developed human beings. To some extent Gigi is the center of the film, but we never get to know her well enough to buy some of her individual actions. It’s a simple matter of math - the more people to focus on in a given time period the more difficult the challenge to provide enough nuance to make each of them seem whole. Still, there are funny moments, decent writing, a lot of attractive actors who do well in their roles, and the film is well-paced and well-shot. The soundtrack is also an interesting pop mix - The Cure; REM; The Ting Tings; Howlin Wolf; Wilco; Keane, etc. There are so many leads that there’s no room for the actors in minor roles like Kris Kristofferson as Beth’s Dad and Luis Guzman as a building contractor (Theresa Russell can be seen on the DVD extras as Anna’s Mom, but was cut out of the film). Definitely not a good a choice for newly dating couples to watch together - particularly if either or both are just not that into the other.
June 12th, 2009 at 3:11 pm
The movie seemed like a vehicle for the actors and was somewhat incoherent. The movie also was pretty stereotypical with traditional gender roles reinforced.
June 12th, 2009 at 3:53 pm
Hi Rich. I can’t exactly disagree, and perhaps I was a little forgiving in terms of the review. I think my expectations for what is produced in Hollywood is so low at this point that I sometimes grasp at straws a bit. While I didn’t find coherence to be a major problem, I agree that the entire film plays like an excuse to get a lot of famous, attractive actors together, and there was definitely some reinforcement of standard issue gender roles. I mentioned the Ginnifer Goodwin character, which I think was the most egregious example. It is true that although there were variations on the them the main characters were basically divided into two camps with the women wanting commitment and the men shying away from deeper intimacy. While the film was no doubt overly simplistic in it’s characterizations, I do think the truisms underlying them were on the whole accurate. While it’s impossible to praise a film for not being what I could or should have been, I thought the performances were, on the whole, strong - particularly Jennifer Aniston, who continues to prove she can act when given the chance. Cut the characters down to a workable number, lop off some of the more obvious bits, and add a little more edge into the mix and there might well have been something here, although I suppose the film has to be judged on what it actually is and the whole affair was probably a bit more dire than I described.