Product: The Next Best Thing (2000)
Rating: 3.0
Good story, mediocre acting, wrecthed DVD transfer.
What do you get when you cross a sucessful story with somewhat tolerable acting and a horrible DVD transfer? A big waste of money, That's what.The Next Best Thing stars Madonna and Rupert Everett as two best friends living in LA. Abbie (Madonna) is a yoga instructor with man problems, or lack thereof. Robert (Everett) is a gay male construction worker/garderner-on-the-side who has a wit and charm to match his sculpted body. On the 4th of July, they both have too many martinis, and find themselves in a compromising situation the next morning. Weeks later, Abbie discovers the truth: she's pregnant, and Robert is the father. After the birth, the film skips ahead six years, showing the happy family living it up. However, things get tossed into the wind when a dashing man comes into Abbie's life, and they find that their fragile family must come to terms with some shocking truths.The subject matter of this story is superb, with some excellent dialogue and brilliant scenes that would have people crying and laughing in various scenes of the movie. However, it is the acting, for the most part, that gives this film a lackluster look. While the actors come off as giving it their best shot at making the scenes and dialogue believable, it only comes out as sounding forced. And a good storyline is not sufficient enough to make up for the lack of emotion on the actors' parts.Also, I must say that the DVD transfer of this film is one of the worst I've ever seen. The image quality is somewhat lacking in color clarity, although the images do appear crisp and sharp. But the sound quality of the disc is utter and complete Dolby Digital blasphemy, exhibiting and overall low-volume output. Many viewers will be turning up their systems higher than usual.So anyway, now that you've read this review, I will leave it up to you to judge whether or not this movie is for you. It is for me, but only about once or twice a year.