Review of Dan in Real Life (2007) by Davin G — 02 Aug 2010

I'm always torn between wanting to take a peak another's opinion of a movie prior to seeing it, and ignoring their reviews completely to avoid going into a release with an unbiased opinion. I followed the second choice fairly well in this case, but one critic's line stuck with me:

"Dan In Real Life is more like Dan In [i]Unreal [/i]Life".

That being said, I thought there would be a strong chance that this one would be fairly unrealistic. By movies end it my guess proved more than a partially accurate.

Though the trials that Dan experienced were uncharacteristic of an average span of time for the typical person, that doesn't make them unfathomable. If I were to have a movie made about some part of my life, I expect that the only way it would be marketable is taking some of the more exciting outside of the box situations and putting them to script. I trust that not many people would find entertainment in an ordinary week in even the most interesting individual. So with grain of salt in hand, I forgive the title for being a mismatch with its plot.

Dan, played by Steve Carrel, is a widowed Father of 3 daughters. During their usually family vacation with relatives, he runs into a woman at a bookstore who captures his interest. After a small conversation, it's easy to see that the two have immediate chemistry. The problems commence when he learns that not only has she just recently begun dating his brother, she's also been invited to stay with them.

At this point the audience begins to play the guessing game of "who will she end up with?" That in mind, and figuring that Hollywood would grace me with the usual sappy ending, I stead concentrated on how cleverly things were to unfold.

Obviously there was going to be some awkward situations, but I was hoping to see something that would really stand out as creative genius. Other than one notable bathroom scene everything else was pretty run of the mill. From a comedic standpoint, I must admit that I was almost in stitches of a few occasions. Being a big fan of Carrels work this didn't really come with much surprise.

The rest of the cast I found very weak, even the part of his love interest. If you've seen The Family Stone, Meet The Parents, or even Home Alone, you know the formula movies usually encompass when portraying a family. The caring mother, the wise quiet father, the goofy brother, and so on. I'm almost to the point where I feel this mixture is unavoidable in romantic comedies, but that does not excuse the dull performances the actors give.

Good light hearted fun? Sorta. Heart warming? Slightly. Hilarious? Very sporadically. In its attempt to be all of the above it hardly succeeds in any department. When this is the case a movie really needs a few stellar scenes to give it concrete replay value. Sadly I don't recall any and I've just finished the movie minutes ago. So once again I find myself in the middle ground where I am neither impressed or disappointed. If you had to tip me one way or the other however, I'd probably fall to the latter.

Rating: 4 out of 10.