Is it a comedy or something else?

Rating: Null/10 (11 July 2006)

The film starts out like the typical comedy you expect from the trailers and teasers and slowly becomes somewhat more unnerving. Hopefully most of us don't work for someone as awful as Meryl Streep's character, but these days there seems to be a lot of ringing truth in the cow-towing that goes on in the work-place along with the excessive hours that come quite close to home. Was it intentional? Is it because Meryl Streep is so good that he becomes all to real? Hard to say. I do feel that the script feels like it was written by committee with different writers adding their own style and take so in the end we have a film that is a comedy, a drama and doesn't move well between the two. There's little resolution to the story and by the time we see the two leads meeting one another on the street at the end, you really don't care nor do you feel like the Streep character is even worth acknowledging. She is cold, mercenary and down-right apathetic in the worst way. Who'd want to acknowledge her for anything other than seeing the back of her.
The acting is the only thing that makes the film worth watching. Streep is excellent and so is Anne Hathaway who has not gotten her due in this film from most critics. Stanley Tucci always terrific does a great turn and even in a small role Adrien Grenier charismatically holds the screen quite well. Were it not for the actors, I'd have given the film a 1 rating.