Product: The Next Best Thing (2000)
Rating: 3.0
"We Really Messed Up."
It is good that the director John Schlesinger will not be judged by this movie alone since he gave us so many fine movies-- SUNDAY BLOODY SUNDAY, MARATHON MAN, MIDNIGHT COWBOY, FAR FROM THE MADDING CROWD, COLD COMFORT FARM, to name a few. Sadly THE NEXT BEST THING does not make the list. So many things are wrong here. For starters, both Madonna and Rubert Everett are terribly miscast, and the screenplay should be rewritten.I have seen the movie three times now, hoping against hope that I can find new things to like in this movie. By far the best thing-- about the only good thing in the movie is the younster who plays Everett and Madonna's child. He's quite wonderful but alone cannot save this movie. For the most part, the lines are trite, the characters are wooden, the older gay men are hopeless stereotypes. Somebody should have told someone, the director, the producer, the actors, that this movie doesn't succeed on any level. Apparently no one was honest enough to say that.Near the end of the movie, Madonna-- well, her name is Abbie, but I'm convinced she is playing herself-- meets up with Everett and says, "We really messed up this time; didn't we?"At last she finally got something right.