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Music
and Lyrics**1/2
*ing: Hugh Grant, Drew Barrymore, Brad Garrett
Directed by Marc Lawrence
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Reviewing
romantic comedies is a difficult thing to do; judge them too critically
and you may be told "but they are supposed to be light and fluffy
and not exactly intellectually challenging". Don't take it seriously
enough and you may end up recommending to people to waste two hours
of their lives, which they will never get back, on mind-numbing sap
.
Music and Lyrics presents one with a similar sort of dilemma. While
I wouldn't go so far as calling it mind-numbing sap, the movie does
leave a lot to be desired. |
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| Hugh
Grant is Alex Fletcher; a 1980's has-been pop star whose current life
is but a shadow of the glory days when his band 'Pop!' was all the
rage. (The opening sequence of the movie is actually a video of a
song by the band and it has to be one of the funniest scenes in the
entire movie!) Now while he makes the rounds at malls, high school
reunions and amusement parks serenading middle aged housewives and
driving them mad with his hip shaking moves, his band mate sits pretty
in Hollywood as a multi-millionaire with extremely successful solo
projects under his belt. Alex finally gets a lucky break when the
hottest artist on the current pop scene, Cora Corman (think pre-head
shaving Britney with a touch of Christina) asks him to write a song
for her, a duet, which if she likes he would get to perform with her
at her sold-out concert in Madison Square Gardens. |
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The
only problem is that he is a terrible lyricist and hasn't actually
written a song in years! Enter Sophie Fisher (Drew Barrymore) his
clumsy, quirky "substitute" plant lady who impresses Alex
with her songwriting skills when she mumbles off a few lines to a
melody he's playing while she is watering his plants.
What follows is a lot of "But I can't write songs" and "Yes
you can" mixed in with the 'opening up to each other' scenes
through which we discover Sophie's real story, and all the while the
perfect pop love song gets written. A word of warning: even if you
don't like pop music the songs have a tendency to crawl inside your
head and refuse to leave. |
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There
is no denying that these movies require some suspension of disbelief
however, contrived storylines and tepid chemistry between the two
romantic leads cannot be overlooked. Even the 'big fight' between
Sophie and Alex falls completely flat when it did have the potential
to be more powerful. And the 'grand romantic gesture' leading to
the reunion of the lovers and the 'happily ever after' well…lets
just say a stronger ending would have left a better impression!
Hugh Grant has the market cornered on playing the disarmingly charming
and funny leading man in romantic comedies and he is spot on in
this one too. He is totally convincing as Alex and he leaves you
thinking no one could have played the role better. Drew Barrymore
on the other hand was quite disappointing. Known for her comedic
roles one expected a lot more from her but she left one under whelmed.
There were times when she was just annoying and you would have been
forgiven for thinking 'if these two don't end up together it might
actually be a good thing!'
The movie's only redeeming factor is that it knows it's a big hunk
of cheese and it doesn't pretend to be otherwise. That and the witty
one-liners from Hugh. Music and Lyrics does have its moments but
they are few and far between.
Recommended if you are absolutely in the mood for a romantic comedy
and have completely exhausted the list of all the decent ones released
over the last year.
--Zainab Hamid
*YUCK
**WHATEVER
***GOOD
****SUPER
*****AWESOME
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