Love for the Date Doctor

Rating: 9/10 (17 February 2015)

"No guile, no game... No girl". Alex "Hitch" Hitchens (Will Smith) is the Love Guru. He can get any guy a real chance with the girl of their dreams. Hitch works in secret for he wants the guys to seem genuine in their courtship of their women. The film is a romantic comedy that flows very well from beginning to end. The theme of the story is very predictable, but with the way it's presented, it works. Hitch appears to be the guy with all the moves to get the ladies. He's faced with his biggest challenge as a Love Guru when Albert (Kevin James), a chubby accountant, is in love with Allegra Cole (Amber Valletta), a rich heiress. Once Hitch gets plans in motion to help Albert gain the attention of Allegra, he finds a love interest of his own, Sara (Eva Mendes). Sara is a columnist for a gossip newspaper. These story lines essentially carry on to the end of the movie. This movie had a star-studded cast in my opinion. Will Smith was excellent with keeping it light and being funny, but also being serious or romantic when the moment called for it. Kevin James was absolutely amazing. He did a great job of being the awkward guy; he really did it at the perfect level. And I think everyone has to appreciate the inhaler scene. Eva Mendes does a good job of being the closed girl who shows no interest in ever having a significant other. Lastly, Amber Valletta does a good job of revealing her character slowly throughout the movie. At first, many would think there is no shot Allegra and Albert could end up together, but as the movie goes on the viewer realizes how similar they really are. All of their little quirks line up perfectly with each other. Director Andy Tennant may have tried to squeeze too much into this movie. It seems like he tried to squeeze too many story lines into one movie. First you have Allegra/Albert, and then it's Hitch/Sara, which leads to Sara's job as a celebrity columnist, and finally a sleezeball who hooked up with Sara's best friend. With so many subplots going on, it was hard to wrap up all of them fully, and Tennant obviously struggled with this. Kevin Bisch scripted the movie extremely well. Balancing plenty of witty remarks and sappy, romantic quotes used by Hitch. A prime example being, "Life is not the amount of breaths you take, it's the moments that take your breath away". Some certainly will get sick of the deep, profound quotes that seem so obviously scripted, but others will appreciate how they play into the movie. The movie is a classic romantic comedy, but it also has enough of it's own individuality to set it apart from other average movies of the genre. Hitch was a typical romantic comedy movie, but it brought just enough extra material to make it a step above the romantic comedies we've become used to. I'm sure there are some who don't appreciate how fun the movie is, and see it just as another run of the mill movie. I really liked the movie and didn't see it as a typical 'chick flick', and believe this is a movie for all, not just couples or women.