I basically enjoyed Definitely, Maybe, with the always wonderful Abigail Breslin who coerces her father, in the process of being divorced by her mother, into telling her the story of how he met her mother. So, he tells her the story, changing the names and some details as he goes along.
The movie does a good job recreating 1992 New York City and a somewhat befuddled young man William (Ryan Reynolds) who's temporarily left his college sweetheart Emily (Elizabeth Banks) back in Madison. William has gone to work for Bill Clinton's campaign. And, at this point, the movie failed my "if you can't get the simple details right" test.
Here are my beefs: if you are sent from one state to another and put up in a hotel for weeks, you are not going to be "toilet paper boy," you are going to be higher up in the organization. I can't imagine there being a $12 an hour copier-runner in a campaign now, much less in 1992. Those are both the sort of jobs the high school, college kids and interns get, who are there working for free. I know because I've had those kids of jobs on campaigns.
And, campaigners not wearing their candidate's button almost constantly on their lapels? Let's be real! Now, some of the campaign stuff was spot on - the long hours, the chaos, the big open office, the ra-ra nature of the enterprise. And, certainly, later on, another campaign collapsing very rapidly amid bitterness and recriminations.
In the course of working on the Clinton campaign, he meets April (Isla Fisher), who's an odd combination of flaky and charming. They have this very funny smoking scene which would, more typically, occur between two high school students but it works well anyway.
Along the way, he also meets Summer (Rachel Weisz). There's a very amusing subplot about who else she is involved with, and it's a bit of a surprise.
So, the question is, which one is his soon-to-be-ex-wife? The basic problem with this movie is, while there are times when William is shows to be quite competent and even charming, most of the time he's depressed and some of the time he's drunk on top of that. By the time he's telling this story to his daughter, he has more of his life back together, except for the fact his wife is splitting with him.
But why? I think one of the real problems is, since more of the action of the story takes place 10-15 years in the past, there's a giant disconnect with the present. Yes, there are clues, but still...the fact that he's in the middle of a divorce, and it's clear his wife is doing the divorcing, leaves a funny void near the end of the movie.
The other problem is that while Ryan Reynolds is a fine-looking actor, I wish someone with a little more depth had the lead. I wish the leading male had been as charismatic as the four leading females!
The movie does a good job recreating 1992 New York City and a somewhat befuddled young man William (Ryan Reynolds) who's temporarily left his college sweetheart Emily (Elizabeth Banks) back in Madison. William has gone to work for Bill Clinton's campaign. And, at this point, the movie failed my "if you can't get the simple details right" test.
Here are my beefs: if you are sent from one state to another and put up in a hotel for weeks, you are not going to be "toilet paper boy," you are going to be higher up in the organization. I can't imagine there being a $12 an hour copier-runner in a campaign now, much less in 1992. Those are both the sort of jobs the high school, college kids and interns get, who are there working for free. I know because I've had those kids of jobs on campaigns.
And, campaigners not wearing their candidate's button almost constantly on their lapels? Let's be real! Now, some of the campaign stuff was spot on - the long hours, the chaos, the big open office, the ra-ra nature of the enterprise. And, certainly, later on, another campaign collapsing very rapidly amid bitterness and recriminations.
In the course of working on the Clinton campaign, he meets April (Isla Fisher), who's an odd combination of flaky and charming. They have this very funny smoking scene which would, more typically, occur between two high school students but it works well anyway.
Along the way, he also meets Summer (Rachel Weisz). There's a very amusing subplot about who else she is involved with, and it's a bit of a surprise.
So, the question is, which one is his soon-to-be-ex-wife? The basic problem with this movie is, while there are times when William is shows to be quite competent and even charming, most of the time he's depressed and some of the time he's drunk on top of that. By the time he's telling this story to his daughter, he has more of his life back together, except for the fact his wife is splitting with him.
But why? I think one of the real problems is, since more of the action of the story takes place 10-15 years in the past, there's a giant disconnect with the present. Yes, there are clues, but still...the fact that he's in the middle of a divorce, and it's clear his wife is doing the divorcing, leaves a funny void near the end of the movie.
The other problem is that while Ryan Reynolds is a fine-looking actor, I wish someone with a little more depth had the lead. I wish the leading male had been as charismatic as the four leading females!