The endless barrage of 1960's cinematic clichés, sly asides and insider jokes make this movie hard to watch at points, but McGregor, Zellweger, Hyde Pierce and Paulson are all immensely likable characters. I would never have dreamed, for instance, that the same Hyde Pierce who became so tiresome (not to mention old-looking) on "Frasier" would have had such a warm and funny and youthful performance in him. And yet, at bottom, there is so little difference between his characters in the series and the movie. I'm not sure what makes the difference. Probably the absence of Kelsey Grammar and the presence of a script that was not generated by a TV sitcom-writing machine. (Or maybe it's a committee of machines.) Nevertheless, I have to say that there were moments in this movie that severely tried my patience. I remember reading a review of "The Graduate" once that compared the movie to a friend invited to dinner who is witty and engaging at the beginning of the evening, but as the party wears on, it becomes increasingly evident that his mind is unhinged. The same could be said for this movie, times ten. It just...won't...stop. Sure, it's funny when Hyde Pierce picks up the vermouth bottle and literally waves it above the martini shaker without so much as taking the cap off, and sure, like the sucker I am, I think to myself how wonderfully sharp I must be to pick up on a little touch like that. But somewhere around the fifteenth or twentieth little such trick, I conclude that, either I'm not nearly so sharp as the movie is trying to convince me I am, or else I am literally the only person on Earth who understands all of its little jokes. Since I am fairly certain that I didn't write the screenplay, I have to conclude that the movie is trying a little bit too hard, and has spun out of control. I begin to feel a bit like Vikki when she was flattened by Catcher Block's remote-control bed.
Add in the 1960's-TV-variety-show number while the credits roll, and it's just about enough to make me run from the theater, hands pressed to my temples, screaming incoherently about the Communists and fluoridation and soylent green is people.
Still, if you've ever had a soft spot in your heart for the 1950's and 1960's working-girl romantic comedies and dramas, you owe it to yourself to see this movie. Just...be prepared. Maybe keep a leather strap that you can clench between your teeth at appropriate moments.
Incidentally, to see a classic example of the kind of movie this one lampoons, see "The Best of Everything."
Add in the 1960's-TV-variety-show number while the credits roll, and it's just about enough to make me run from the theater, hands pressed to my temples, screaming incoherently about the Communists and fluoridation and soylent green is people.
Still, if you've ever had a soft spot in your heart for the 1950's and 1960's working-girl romantic comedies and dramas, you owe it to yourself to see this movie. Just...be prepared. Maybe keep a leather strap that you can clench between your teeth at appropriate moments.
Incidentally, to see a classic example of the kind of movie this one lampoons, see "The Best of Everything."