‘Valentine’s Day’ is First and Foremost, Unnecessary
-----Girls will like this film. In the spirit of avoiding stereotypes, let me specify that girls who liked the trailer will like the film. There’s really no other way to start a review where I’m going to agree with the majority of film buffs while simultaneously alienating the young female demographic, most of which will be in love with the film. But there it is, and as the ridiculous Box Office haul indicates, if you pack enough young stars into a chic flick, the chicks will come. As for me, it wasn’t nearly as bad as the trailer suggested, but it remains as I stated in the title; unnecessary.
-----‘Valentine’s Day’ follows the lives of about 50 people throughout, yep, Valentine’s Day. As their stories interweave, a number of couples are examined, including everything from long married to newly engaged to two week relationships; most of them being unnecessary fluff that we’ve all seen many times before. Never slow paced, the film does a surprisingly nice job of balancing them, even if the majority of the tales are so-so procedurals.
-----As has been obvious since the release of the trailer, the poster, and really anything having to do with ‘Valentine’s Day,’ the film has more stars than the night sky. And really most of them are dead weight. While it would be ridiculous to give an in depth analysis on every individual actor (not to mention there’s nothing to go in depth to), I have decided to give a brief description of every single prominent star’s role in the film. Ashton Kutcher plays a likable Ashton Kutcher who’s confused about his apparent fiancée’s feelings for him. Playing that fiancée is the always gorgeous Jessica Alba in a tiny role that, while insignificant, is worth having in the movie for the simple fact of putting Alba on more film. Jennifer garner plays Ashton’s best friend who’s in a relationship with a shady Doctor (played plainly by Patrick Dempsey), in another likable performance. Rounding out the people who actually have any value in the film are Ashton’s funny florist business partner played by the entertaining George Lopez, and Julia Roberts in a small but sincere enough part.
-----Now that I’ve shaken out the actors whose enjoyable performances, if still shallow due to screen time, made the film a bearable outing, I’ll talk about all the extra baggage that could have been dumped off. The typically good Kathy Bates is in about thirty seconds of the film, thank you marketers. The attractive Jessica Biel plays a wacky (and annoying) lovesick PR agent for a football player on the edge of retirement. The football player is played dully by Eric Dane. Playing a sports commentator following the athlete’s decision is Jamie Foxx with an adequate performance. Playing the football player’s decision-making agents are the pretty Anne Hathaway and outrageous Queen Latifah…as themselves. Playing Hathaway’s boyfriend is Topher Grace, also as his typical self. Playing a guy he meets at an outdoor sit-in movie is Hector Elizondo in an adequate turn opposite his longtime wife in the film; played by Shirley McClaine. These two may have been OK had their subplot not been one of the film’s most plainly cliché, taken right off the pages of so many bad sit-com melodramas. Playing their grandson is youngling Bryce Robinson, whose soul purpose seems to be “awwww” moments from the female audience; and he gets them, but I was far too annoyed by the blatant manipulation of his scenes to lend him my sympathy. Laying his babysitter (or at least trying to) is an unknown face-(gasp!) in Carter Jenkins. The actual babysitter and her character’s boyfriend are weird for two reasons. First, they’re both unknowns, her being played by Emma Roberts. Second, they have more screen time than the highly hyped Taylor duo. And guess what, their mediocre performances lend only to cliché gag humor in their attempt to have sex together; it’s “planned.” Playing their Taylor-duo friends Willy and Felicia are Taylor Lautner and Taylor Swift, as ridiculously stupid people…and surprisingly enough, it’s not funny. Although, Lautner did have one laugh-worthy line in which he admits to his girlfriend that he doesn’t feel comfortable taking his shirt off in public. If that was a legitimate reference to his role in last year’s ‘New Moon,’ then I was the only one in the theater who found it funny. And wait, there’s still one more star to come; Bradley Cooper, the dude who’s in seemingly everything since his hilarious turn in ‘The Hangover,’ plays a guy talking to Julia Roberts on a plane. And I must say his subplot has one of the goofiest and most unbelievably forced, while simultaneously ridiculously cliché, outcomes in true “please everyone” fashion. And that is all. Oh yeah, and Hathaway has phone sex. Just thought I ought to throw that out there.
-----‘Valentine’s Day’ opens dutifully skipping from one couple to the next, in scenes primarily concerned with showing off the gorgeous legs of the women leads as they awaken to their peppy boyfriends. After the first twenty to thirty minutes when we’ve just finally met all of the characters, the film starts to get its rhythm a bit, and Director Gary Marshall spreads the screen time surprisingly well. Of course, none of it is very funny, and plenty of the storylines…in fact, all of the storylines pretty much act as bare-bones retellings of storylines we’ve seen before. This makes any sort of real interest impossible, as the whole film works like 15 superficial romantic comedies compiled into one spectacularly formulaic outing. On the plus side, this does at least avoid the boredom that comes with seeing one conventional script stretched over 90 minutes, but in reality it ensures that everything stays completely predictable and extremely shallow. Alas, if only the minor charm of the few stars who managed to reasonably entertain and interact had more than their allotted twenty minutes of screen time (if they were lucky).
-----The cinematography adequately captures the various Los Angeles locations, and they are some pretty locations at that. But then, how hard is it really to find good locations in California? The art direction is also consistent in its employ of pink-and-red-laden participants, though nothing stands out as particularly special in the production, much like the bulk of the film itself.
-----In its element, those sold on the trailer will love seeing their favorite stars running around the screen frantically trying to force-feed the audience the various “romantic” plotlines we all saw last week. And on that note, I’m not sure there was a male in the world sold on the trailer, as the film does little to disguise its demographic. I will give it one thing, it’s not nearly as bad as the self-righteous, melodramatic, jump-around ensemble ‘Crash’ was, as a film that proved you too can win a Best Picture Academy Award, so long as you point out blatant racial stereotypes and take yourself seriously; but that’s another story. As for ‘Valentine’s Day,’ it should be a bearable outing for most of the guys who will reluctantly be dragged to it, seeing as the pace is so fast there’s little time allowed for the painful clichés to simmer too long, and perhaps that was the intent of the film’s speedy yet steady pace. As for all the females who will no doubt continue to disown every new critical slamming of the genre, read my review for ‘Leap Year,’ a formulaic but at least somewhat intimate rom-com from January. Bottom line, sometimes conventional is OK, given the execution is sound enough; but think back on this one a day after your viewing and it will become apparent that 90% of the subplots became downright annoying, along with proving extremely forgettable. ‘Valentine’s Day’ isn’t a terrible film (nor one nearly as bad as the trailer pushed me to believe), but there are other options out there. So don’t run blindly to the theater because your favorite star has a thirty-second cameo; yes, that means you, ‘Twilight’ fans.
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