Genre: Comedy
Director: Andy Fickman
Cast: Kristen Bell, Sigourney Weaver, Jamie Lee Curtis, Odette Yustman, Betty White, Victor Garber, Kristin Chenoweth
RunTime: 1 hr 35 mins
Released By: Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures
Rating: PG
Official Website: http://youagain-themovie.com/

Opening Day: 21 October 2010

Synopsis:

Successful PR pro Marni (Kristen Bell) heads home for her older brother's (Jimmy Wolk) wedding and discovers that he's marrying her high school arch nemesis (Odette Yustman), who's conveniently forgotten their problematic past. Then the bride's jet-setting aunt (Sigourney Weaver) bursts in and Marni's not-so-jet-setting mom (Jamie Lee Curtis) comes face to face with her own high school rival. The claws come out and old wounds are opened in this crazy comedy that proves that not all rivalries are forever.

Movie Review:

You wouldn’t want to remember that part of your life when you were the number one target of hipper fashionistas in school. Yes, that period of your life when you were a social outcast, a pimply geek who was too embarrassed to even walk out of the house. But all’s fine now, because you are a successful figure at work, and you are held in high esteem by your colleagues and peers in the industry. Wait, this doesn’t sound familiar? Oh, you are still a nobody with any spectacular achievements in life? Then how did the female protagonist in this movie do it?

It’s a movie, that’s why. And a romantic comedy at that. So when everything comes to a nice fit in the end, you’d be scorning the dreary stuff that Hollywood throws in your face these days.

The female protagonist is a young girl who realises that her brother is about to marry the girl who bullied her in high school. Back then, she was a nerd with bad complexion and ugly glasses. Now that she has nice hair and pretty dresses, she is determined to expose the fiancée’s true colours at all cost. Throw in a mother (of the groom) and the aunt (of the bride) who happens to be loggerheads when they were young, and you get a girly rom com that involves catfights, screams and showdowns. The resultant effect? A comedy that comes across as a desperate attempt to milk laughs.

The plot development is mediocre at best, with its predictable twist of events, right up to the very last 105th minute of the movie. We wouldn’t consider this a spoiler, but having the girls patching up after a series of shrill screams and shots at tearing each other apart (figuratively and literally)? Yawn. There is really no need to prolong the drama beyond 80 minutes, in our humble opinion.

Kristen Bell (Forgetting Sarah Marshall) and Odette Yustman (The Unborn) play the bully and the bullied. The two young American actresses have their unique charms. A blonde haired sweetie and a jet black haired babe – both would have their own fan bases. It helps that both fresh faces are pleasing to the eye too. Veterans Jamie Lee Curtis (Freaky Friday) and Sigourney Weaver (Avatar) play the older pair of enemies. While it is hilarious to see the older women slugging out on screen, it does get tiresome after a while. Credit still goes to the two acclaimed actresses for effortlessly carrying off their roles. And yes, they do look gorgeous in their outfits, despite Curtis being 51 and Weaver being ten years older. Elsewhere, there is also comedienne and former game show host Betty White playing a grandmother who flashes some serious dance moves.

The talents gathered for the Andy Fickman movie are not to blame for the unfunny movie, because while they evidently put in their best for the production (and looks like they had fun doing it too), the picture just doesn’t go beyond a contrived effort to throw pretty actresses in an ugly situation, mess them up before cueing a comedic score to milk chuckles.

Sorry, in this day and age, audiences won’t buy that.

Movie Rating:



(This is what a romantic comedy shouldn’t be)

Review by John Li