BOTTOM
LINE:
Cute
film with a likeable cast but still bogged down by cliches and some
all-too-convenient plot points.
THE
GOOD: A
romantic comedy needs a likeable cast and with Diane Keaton leading
the way, you're off to a good start. She turns in a frantic and
OCD-style performance as Daphne, the mother of three girls. Two
of the girls are doing fine with their relationships but they youngest
Milly (played by Mandy Moore) never seems to be able to have any
luck to the point where Daphne is very afraid that Milly will become
alone like her. Daphne sets a plan in action to go through a dating
site to interview prospective boyfriends for Milly. In the process,
she encounters a charming young musician named Johnny (Gabriel Macht)
who watches her initial interview procedure at a bar he is playing
at. Johnny steals one Milly's business cards from Daphne and decides
to introduce himself. And so begins a three-way love triangle between
Milly, Johnny, and Daphne's first choice Jason. All of this is a
fine setup and lends itself to some great character moments and
some cute scenes between all those involved. Of course, there's
always drama to be had, especially when all parties involved find
out what's going on and Milly suddenly realises that she had a good
shot with Johnny but wasted it by seeing Jason at the same time.
The film plays through some nice character moments between mothers
and daughters (Mandy Moore contributes much to the cuteness as the
wholesome Milly) and with the fine actors on board provides for
some genuine interaction between them.
THE
BAD: The
place where this film falls down, apart from the cliches, is a couple
of way too convenient plot points designed to push the character of
Daphne to the place she needs to go to reconcile with Milly as well
as herself. Johnny's father, Joe, goes to Milly's house looking for
Johnny and inadvertanty bumps in to Daphne. In an hour or two, Joe
manages to convert the extremely uptight, never-take-a-risk, never
do anything unplanned Daphne in to jumping in to bed with him and
throwing her life upside down. This conveniently makes Daphne re-think
what she's doing with Milly which leads to not only their reconciliation
but Milly's reconciliation with Johnny. You have to let this go to
make the whole thing work and it's pretty hard to because you'll be
asking yourself, "that's completely out of line with what's been
going on for the whole film!". At any rate, with the short running
time of 90 minutes perhaps they didn't have the budget to include
a few extras scene to fill the gap.