Sunday, May 16, 2010

Leap Year: Movie Review

(2010, directed by: Anand Tucker, written by: Deborah Kaplan and Harry Elfont, starring: Amy Adams and Matthew Goode)





So many mistakes, it's not even a romantic comedy anymore—it's worse.

I tend to like most romantic comedies. I really disliked Leap Year.

Anna is our main character, successful but not yet engaged. She's desperate to get married (one of the many aspects of her character that bothered me), so we are off to Ireland to propose to her boyfriend Jeremy. Cue all the problems. I was prepared for all the ridiculous obstacles in getting to Dublin, but I wasn't prepared for Anna's extreme selfishness in forcing everybody she meets to get her there. Because I found Anna so unlikeable, I couldn't find the humour in any of the contrived (not actually existent) travel problems in Ireland.

Ireland is a great setting, but they didn't really show us any part of it. Every time they had an opportunity for a beautiful wide shot of the countryside, they instead filled the screen with Amy Adams' and Matthew Goode's faces. Sure they are pretty, but Ireland is prettier.

This movie also had a lot of mistakes. All the geography of Ireland that they tried to show us was wrong. The bit of back-story that they gave for Anna was contrary to the selfish, superficial girl she is.

I am the target audience for this movie, and yet I hated it. I can't find a single redeeming quality. They missed the mark big time.