Colorful, energetic but sexist and dumb

Rating: 5/10 (23 July 2001)

Small town Jersey girl (Piper Perabo) goes to NYC to be a songwriter. While waiting to be discovered she serves drinks (and dances on the bar) of a horrible place called Coyote Ugly. All the bartenders are beautiful, big-breasted, untalented actresses who show as much clevage as a PG-13 rating will allow. As for the "plot" it's been done HUNDREDS of times before. Every single situation and line of dialogue is yawningly predictable. But most of the screen time is devoted to the half-naked bartenders dancing and twitching and (naturally) poring water all over themselves. It's a PG "Showgirls"! I started fast-forwarding through them--there's too many of them and they are dull--although I must admit the women throw their all into it and seem to be enjoying themselves--too bad they didn't realize the movie is objectifying their bodies. And what the hell is John Goodman doing here? Was he really that desperate for the money?
There's a few things that save the film from being a total washout. It is colorful (the bar has tons of little colored lights), the dancing is energetic and Perabo is a good actress and makes for a very liakable heroine. Also Adam Garcia...he can't act (and what a stupid accent!) but when you look like him, who cares? He's very handsome and the movie does show him shirtless a few times (definite highlights). So, there's half-naked woman and a hunky shirtless Garcia. If either of those sound good, this is your movie. Otherwise, stay away--FAR away!!!!!