Tuesday Morning Movie Review!
First off, I must confess that I feel you just cannot go wrong with Drew Barrymore. I just love her. But I was cautious about seeing this movie because Jimmy Fallon kind of bothered me on Saturday Night Live (except as the dude from Boston), PLUS the dreaded Farrelly Brothers were directing this movie.
About 15,665,461 people (one of them being Sarah) absolutely INSISTED that Charlie and I would just LOVE “There's Something About Mary.” Even though I told people that I don’t think gross-out jokes are funny. And I don’t like Cameron Diaz. But, finally, after people just wouldn’t drop it, we finally went. And HATED IT. Absolutely were bored to tears.
So I’ve made a habit of avoiding movies by the Farraly Brothers. But I saw “Shallow Hal” one day when I was home sick, and was shocked—SHOCKED—to find that I enjoyed it and thought it handled the whole fat chick thing reasonably well for a movie that was playing it for laughs.
Plus Nick Hornsby wrote the book “Fever Pitch” is based on. I loved both “About a Boy” and “High Fidelity” (although I love anything with John Cusack—he’s dreamy), both movies based on his books. So, armed with that, and the fact that both Roger Ebert and the New York Times said the movie didn’t suck, we went.
It was absolutely wonderful. Maybe Drew wasn’t all that convincing as a busy ad/marketing/whatever person (it was totally obvious that she was just randomly opening files whenever she tried to look busy), and maybe Jimmy Fallon isn’t John Cusack, but DAMN this was a fine romance.
Because I’m married to a man with a rather arcane hobby/obsession (he’s into freight trains—and no, not model trains), I felt a particular sympathy for Drew’s character as she struggled with Jimmy’s character’s baseball obsession. Wrapping the whole story up around the season that the Red Sox actually WON the World Series is a particular flash of genius. Oh—and Jimmy Fallon’s character rents a copy of Roadhouse in the movie—which is my absolute favorite bad movie of all time.
On a final note, one of the nicest things about the movie is Drew's character has a friend who is a) successful, b) works out with her and her friends, c) is happily married to a good looking man and d) IS FAT!!!! It was so cool. And they didn't mention or address it once. She was just a big, beautiful, fit gal. That was getting laid. Awesome.
So if you want a warm hearted and believable love story—one that actually makes you laugh out loud—this is a great movie for you. And there is not a single cum-in-the-hair joke. Not one.
