Seen this film a hundred times before.

Rating: 4/10 (9 May 2011)

Guy falls for girl. Girl just wants to have sex. Girl falls for guy but doesn't realize it and screws it up. Girl tries to fix things. Girl and guy fall in love at the end. This plot can be used for 85% of the romantic comedy films that are out there today. Just switch the who falls for who part first and you have your movie. You need one aspect of the film that makes it different and gives the viewer a reason for wanting to see it. This film's reason? Two attractive people using each other for sex. Let the fun begin.
No Strings Attached has the benefit of coming out before the carbon copy that is Friends With Benefits. The exact same plot line about people using each other for sex, which causes problems. The dueling films have a bit of irony to them. Natalie Portman stars in No Strings Attached and Mila Kunis stars in Friends With Benefits. So it looks like the duel for the spotlight from Black Swan isn't over and these two films make round 2.
No Strings Attached is Ivan Reitman's first R rated comedy since Stripes. The reason the film is rated R is because they use the F-Word a dozen times. Did that make the film funnier? Not really. If a film is rated R for the language, than I think it should use that to the film's advantage, this film didn't do that. The only bits of comedy that I enjoyed were the scenes with Kevin Kline, who plays Ashton Kutcher's father. He's a famous guy who had one successful show and catchphrase. His success draws the attention of one hot young lady, who coincidentally is Kutcher's ex-girlfriend. This revelation sends Kutcher on a drunken spree where he finds himself waking up naked on Portman's couch. They then decide to have sex and use each other for sex whenever, wherever.
There is a bit of conflict with this one guy who claims to be the type of guy that Portman would marry, while Kutcher is only the type of guy she has sex with in secret. This drama is never explored, it sets itself up to be nothing in the end. There have been quite a bit of films as of late that follow the trend of the female wanting to use the male for sex while he yearns for something more. Love & Other Drugs did the exact same thing, the problem with that film was that it couldn't balance comedy and drama very well. No Strings Attached has problems finding comedy to balance.
Portman is cute, as always. Kutcher is goofy, as always. The supporting cast outshines the main cast, as always. I didn't care if they ended up together in the end. I didn't care about their fights and I didn't care about the hot sex they would have. I simply did not care for this movie. It's clichéd, generic, cookie-cutter, whatever you want to call it. It's a film that you have seen a dozen times before. The question you need to ask yourself is does the prospect of Kutcher and Portman having nonstop sex interest you?