a smart and funny look at meetings between guys and girls

Rating: 8/10 (28 August 2008)

Will Smith (Independence Day) stars as Hitch, a date doctor who helps guys create opportunities to gain courage with women. When Sara and Albert come along, his principles are tested to the extreme.
With an excellent first hour, with slick comedy and likable characters, Hitch tails off into the cliché side of relationships towards the end but still generates a feel good motive to make an enjoyable funny romantic comedy.
The lovable Will Smith is again so likable in his own unique way as the sophisticated date doctor, smart and easily the funniest gut throughout, though Kevin James (The King of Queens) is just as funny, none more so than the dancing sequences and his general clumsiness.
The whole cast is great, and form good on screen chemistry, and do their best with some clumsy dialogue. The last half an hour or so made me feel sicker than Hitch in the fish scene, a complete dramatic insanity with the whole small world and misunderstandings and coincidental meetings used, which is a shame as it had the potential to be a full length slick and sophisticated romantic comedy but was ruined by the everyday use of clichés.
The first hour is excellent though, with a sharp and precise look at the meeting between the sexes, a true look at how guys and girls hit it off, or find it difficult to talk to each other. Packed with humour but an accurate ideology gets the film started in the right way, exciting and realistic and also very funny. The whole concept of the film will make you smile and chuckle along and you will feel slightly let down come the end.
The film is a rare type of successful romantic comedies by having physical and scripted humour which are genuinely funny, which is very rare in modern films which overuse one or the other.
Hitch is a smart natured romantic comedy with a good look at the interaction between guys and girls with a good natured approach, containing a good use of humour which is let down by cheesy dialogue and scenarios in the last half an hour.