Bad, and Not in the Michael Jackson Sense

Rating: 1/10 (29 December 2016)

What a cast, and what a waste of their talents and our time. Every single relationship in this movie -- but for one -- was not only shallow and outright inappropriate, but didn't ring true at all.
A man who just lost the love of his life, his very wife, just days ago, suddenly falls in love with someone else. And his 7-year old son -- who, of course, acts like a world-weary 30 year old -- doesn't grieve the loss of his mother because he's too hung up on some chick he's never spoken to. The father and son's little recreation of the bowsprit scene from "Titanic" is so bad, so stupid and contrived, that I actually laughed out loud. "How'd that bit come about?", I asked myself. "Now, son, you stand in front of me and hold out your arms. I'll stand behind you and hold out my arms. When Winslett and di Caprio do the same in the movie we're watching, we'll feel like we're flying!" Chyeah. Pure goofery -- as was the father's saying to the kid, upon hearing that the boy is in love, "Who is she? Or he?" Shouldn't he have covered *all* the angles? It's almost 2017, man! What if the kid is a pedophile, zoophile, cougar-chaser, furry, or necrophile? And what about that oh-so-bigoted use of classical pronouns? Pops should've asked his boy, "So, who is she, or he, or zhe, or zhim, or the mature woman, or the critter -- alive or stuffed -- or the corpse, or whatever is the object of your affections? Tell me all about zhem, son (you mind if I call you son? Is there another word you'd prefer?)!" Our world is Brave and New, and the statistically rare must be treated as the norm these days or someone might feel left out and start carrying a sign! They might even cry!
Eh, if they do a remake, they'll likely handle that already ridiculous scene that way. And the critics will thumbs-up it all, as they did with this piece of crap.
The little kid's affair results in the standard "chase her down at the airport before she boards that plane" trope, too, with the kid flying by security and setting himself up for a serious smack-down by whatever TSA types are called in England. His Dad smiles. What a good Dad.
Anyway, then there's the guy falling in love with a woman he was completely unable to speak a single word to because they don't share a common language. He didn't just develop a crush; he proposed to her -- without having exchanged a single sentence! That's some good thinking right there! Now, I'm very far from the type to throw the word "misogyny" around, but sometimes the word fits, and this movie is full of it. Women are nothing but bodies in this flick -- and a perfectly lovely woman is treated like some obese freak of nature just because she isn't a size 2. She's probably a size 8, but even that is just too much flesh for a woman to carry around and get away with. The same name-calling happens to another female character as well.
Then there are social and power differentials in this flick's relationships that make them legally questionable and morally iffy. Bosses going after their secretaries, men going after their maids, etc., and worst of all, marital status means absolutely nothing -- not even when it comes to a woman who's been married less than a month! Seriously, this movie is nasty. All the men ended up happy and better off in the end, but any women who'd already celebrated her 30th birthday is S.O.L. One was strangely written off romantically because she has a brother who needs psychiatric care. Another was written off because her husband fell in love with someone younger, and it was his adulterous union that got the script's "awwww, ain't that sweeeeet?"treatment. Never mind the forsaken wife. She'll manage, I guess. Lesson Learned: "Cheating pays! (if you have testicles)."
The only relationship that wasn't nauseating was the one involving the rock star and his manager, and, thank God, it wasn't a romantic one. Love Actually Part II would likely change that.
For realz, if you have a sense of decency and a low tolerance for totally unrealistic schmaltz, skip this load o' tripe unless you're in the mood to hate-watch something. And even then, please don't pay to see it. Don't support stuff like this and maybe they'll start making better movies someday.