Review of “Definitely, Maybe”
A romantic comedy about divorce? Ahhhhh, how sweet! In a storyline that owes much to TV’s How I Met Your Mother (but, unlike that show, doesn’t make me physically ill), Ryan Reynolds plays William Hayes, an advertising executive about to sign his divorce papers. After learning about the true facts behind the birds and the bees at school, his daughter Maya (Breslin) asks him explain how he had met her mother and why they didn’t, like penguins, mate for life. In a film where we already know the outcome (a child and a divorce), Hayes decides to make the story a game (and therefore return some sense of suspense to we the audience) – he will tell her about his three great loves, changing their names along the way, and will let her guess which one is her mother. First we meet his college sweetheart Emily (Elizabeth Banks), who gives him a parcel to deliver in person to her friend Summer (Rachel Weisz) when he leaves for New York to work on President Clinton’s 1992 campaign. In the office he meets the apolitical April (Isla Fisher). Which will he choose – solid Emily, free-spirited Summer, or best friend April?
Definitely, Maybe is the love child of every romantic comedy that came before it. You can see a little When Harry Met Sally here, a little Princess Bride there, but for all its derivativeness, it works. While this is possibly because writer director Adam Brooks has cut his teeth in the genre (writing Wimbledon and Bridget Jones: The Edge Of Reason), this film is far better than either of these – he has tempered the romance with an air of melancholy that makes it more believable. And interestingly, Hayes real love and heartbreak comes from President Clinton and his own women troubles.
Not a laugh-out-loud comedy, it has many really fine moments, especially scenes with Isla Fischer, whose career goes from strength to strength. She is given the chance to shine here, and her chemistry with Reynolds is palpable. And while gorgeous and charming here, didn’t Rachel Weisz win an Oscar but a few years ago? Why is she playing third fiddle in somebody else’s drama? What’s wrong with the world? As expected, Abigail Breslin (Oscar-nominated last year for Little Miss Sunshine) shows us that there are child actors in the world who aren’t gut-achingly saccharine. Quite a few movies were releases en masse this week – if you’re looking for a date movie, I’d say this is the pick.
SW
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