You've Got To Be Kidding Me

Rating: 2/10 (16 August 2008)

I had high hopes for this film, even though I could see before entering that it was only being played at a small number of venues nationwide. Of course, the pre-release buzz about the explicit sexuality was grossly overblown. Oh boy, we get to see Penelope and Scarlett kiss. The basic initial setup for the movie seemed promising enough. You had the Spanish male painter, who previously had been in a tempetuous romance with Cruz's character. Their dealings had to be severed since there was no possible way they could get along. He was transitioning out of Cruz into Christina when Vicky starts attracting his attention. Vicky is the quintessential left-brain female (i.e. driven by logic, order, & rationality). However, the painter is conflicted because he had initially rebounded onto Christina before noticing Vicky. Now, the implicit catfight that is expected never materializes. Instead, we have the farcical threesome relationship where everyone is happy, no one wants too much, and everything works out. The hugest canard of all foisted upon the audience is that the two females engaging in kissing and miscellaneous eroticism toward each other could engage in a one-time dalliance without any long-term alteration of either person. I guess, if Woody's idea is to change reality, he's going to have a lot more to do than put out a single act and idea in a movie to alter things. Christina, on the other hand, is the prototypical right-brain female guided by feelings and creative pursuits. Javier employs a number of devices to illicit sexual desires from both Vicky and Christina. However, Penelope's character re-enters the picture to make the waters more murky. The movie was meandering around trying to find a sensible conclusion to this threesome's predicament when it just abruptly ends. It hearkens back to the early 70's when films had crazy, abrupt conclusions that had people exiting the cinema scratching their head. In this case, they are scratching their heads both trying to figure out both why the movie ended as it did and the more important question being how had they had been suckered again into believing that stars as big as Scarlett or Penelope would show anything or be in any demonstrable way explicitly sexual. I guess if you just want to see pretty women this is fair. However, you can see them without going outside your home (previous movies or internet pictures). This movie can be summed up as a marginal DVD rental at Blockbuster. I guess this film was not viewed positively by me since I had recently seen the exquisite Fay Ann Lee film "Falling For Grace", which was almost flawless. Compared to that, Woody is lucky I even threw him a bone with the DVD rental. Be very careful that you don't get too disappointed with this one.