fading diamonds

Rating: Null/10 (19 February 2010)

It probably can be very ungrateful for someone with any artistic ambition in film to make a romantic comedy that appeals to a large audience (here's a pleonasm). That's because this is probably the genre with more rules to be followed. The thing is fully tailored for the audiences to believe they are watching something fresh, while seeming to be new, and never seen before. As far as my personal experience in these films goes, there are 2 things that can redeem such projects: either the comedy lines and moments are exceptionally well done and catchy, or the protagonist actors/public characters are soaked on an aura of glamour and interesting personalities, like Cary Grant, Audrey Hepburn throughout their careers or Roberts in Pretty Woman. There is a third option, which is to try and shake the genre, like say, the Coens did in Intolerable Cruelty, but that's some hard stuff to do, and hardly tried.
This film doesn't work well to me on any of the 3 options above, so it fades, and fails. This is a film where both the protagonists act their characters. Both are faking to each other, and that's the fun. It's actually an interesting starting point, but the actors have to play along. the thing is McConaughey is an absolute disaster in every respect. He simply can't act, and he tries to disguise that under his over the top accent and his own sense of public personality, which is simply vacuous to me. Kate Hudson has a few poses, and knows how to smile and show her pretty face. Other than that, there's not much more we can count on as well. We are left with a few interesting funny bits, allowed by the writing of the scenes, by the very situations characters are in.
Some bits work well enough as space fillers, but this is not worth an extra look.
My opinion: 1/5
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