It's A Catch

Rating: Null/10 (14 October 2003)

After viewing several times, I found the movie "How To Lose A Guy In Ten Days" extremely cute, heartwarming, and charming. This movie, starring Kate Hudson and Matthew McConaughey, is based on a plot about two twenty-somethings who make bets with friends and colleagues to fall in, or out of love within the allotted ten days. Andie Anderson, Hudson's character, is Composure magazine's `how-to-girl.' She writes low quality how to articles for women. After witnessing a friend's devastating breakup, Andie volunteers to do her next article on `how to lose a guy in ten days,' in which she would `catch' a guy and do everything in her power (by doing things that `normal' women do) to get the guy to dump her within the ten days. With her project in mind, Andie and her friends go out to a bar to find her man. There she meets Ben Barry, McConaughey's character, and Andie thinks she has met her match. However, Ben also has a bet of his own to win.

Ben works for an advertising group and is trying to break into the field of diamonds, a female dominated field in advertising. He makes a bet with his boss and two female colleagues that if he can get a woman to fall in love with him in ten days, he wins the diamond advertising pitch. So, when they first meet, both Ben and Andie are looking for someone to help them win their bets.

The first night goes relatively smoothly, and the relationship continues from there. Andie tries her hardest to get rid of Ben, but Ben is bound and determined to have Andie fall for him. The whole movie revolves around the will-they-or-won't-they idea, and I was on the edge of my seat until the end, not knowing exactly which road the characters would take. I think the purpose of this film is to give the audience some whole-hearted laughs, and allow them to see some of themselves in the characters. The critical techniques used in this film are obvious through the settings, secondary characters, and the music used throughout the movie.