Couldn't. Possibly. Hate. This. More.
12 August 2004
I sort of watched 50 First Dates this morning, while i was waiting for laundry to finish. I say 'sort of' because i loathed it so much after the first 10 minutes that i watched in horrified fascination for 30 minutes and then, feeling slightly queasy, skipped through the rest in 5 minute chunks just to see how this heinous festival of suckage could possibly be brought to a conclusion that hadn't made it famous throughout the known universe as the most cringe worthy waste of celluloid since ..well..actually the last Adam Sandler film.

Only 'Little Nicky' was worse than this, though I cant say for sure because I never made it past the first 20 minutes of that, (the part where it was deemed hysterical to have breasts growing on someone's head) after realising life was too precious to waste on such compellingly awful dross.

I hesitate to dignify '50 First Dates' by analysing it, even for the purpose of this commentary, because analysis seems to somehow to endorse its poorly executed and insultingly simple minded premise.

From the opening scene where Henry is seen to be a opportunistic wide boy and congenital liar who has abundant and casual sex with any tourist stupid enough to fall for his drooling halfwit persona: 'Uh, I'm a ..ya know..uh..secret agent, so I cant see you again', I assumed he would get his come-uppance and learn the error of his ways in a predictable retribution/redemption scenario. Unfortunately this was not to be, as he is in fact rewarded for being a shallow dullard by winning the ever-so-cute mental patient of his dreams.

Some notable scenes which provoked uneasy gastric reminders of my breakfast were when he punishes his co-worker for eating his roast beef sandwich by asking her to put her face next to a walrus's mouth and makes it vomit over her; when his horrendous Hawaiian stereotyped surfing, pothead buddy dresses up as the aforementioned mental patient cutie by wearing a mop head as a wig and a coconut bra and licks his coconut 'nipples' for no apparent reason than to make a cinema audience of 11 year old boys snicker; when an entire ward of brain damaged patients fall about laughing because someone mentions the phrase 'wet dreams'.

Why did her good natured, steroid-taking brother need to have a lisp? Why did his friend need to be blind? Why were all the Hawaiian women clinically obese? It smacked of 'Let's all laugh at the freaks' schoolboy humour, devoid of wit, style, kindness or relevance. Why did a random character on a beach, whom we hadn't met before, and never met again, suddenly snicker and say 'I have to go for a tinkle'. Were they THAT hard up for dialogue?

I normally would have gone about my business after this talentless garbage was over - after all its not as if i paid to see it. But I logged onto IMDb to see if other people had been similarly appalled, and instead found pages of praise! This naturally enraged me enough to attempt a tiny redressing of the balance. Anyone with an IQ higher than that of cheese should really not see this movie. Its too late for me - but save yourselves!
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