Review of Isn't It Romantic (2019) by Markhreviews — 23 Feb 2019

You have to give the writers of “Isn’t it Romantic” some credit. It takes courage to offer several minutes of exposition early on about the flaws of romantic comedy and then go out and make a rom-com. Fortunately, the story by actor-turned-writer Erin Cardillo, co-written with Dana Fox and Katie Silberman, doesn’t take itself too seriously, totally willing to be self-referential, self-aware and even self-deprecating.

The set-up is more than a little formulaic. Natalie (Rebel Wilson) collides with a girder after fighting off a purse-snatcher, knocking herself out and causing her to wake up in a parallel universe. The resulting hallucination provides her with a gorgeous new apartment, a compliant pet, a sexless dalliance with Liam Hemsworth (whose saxophone playing in the closing credits is priceless) and a stand-off with a supermodel over the man she loves. Plotting is not the strong point here. Along the way, there is madness, mayhem and more than a few laughs. Soon after waking up at the hospital, Natalie is informed that her clothes have been destroyed. The staff “puts together a few things,” and she walks out in a dress, hat and handbag identical to Julia Roberts’ iconic “Pretty Woman” wardrobe. When offered a ride to a weekend party in the Hamptons, she says, “You had me at hello-copter.” Natalie even launches into a profanity-laced tirade, only to have her offending words bleeped by a truck on the bridge overhead: “My life has become a motherf…[bleep] romantic comedy, and it’s rated PG.” When the world returns to normal, this merriment is capped off with Natalie’s rapturous exclamation, “New York is a **** again!” Perhaps most interesting of all is the catfight between Natalie and billboard model Isabella (Priyanka Chopra, Bollywood actress and Miss World 2000) over Josh (Adam DeVine, reprising his role as Wilson’s love interest from the first two “Pitch Perfect” installments). Their karaoke stand-off is completely over the top and thoroughly inspired. The plot doesn’t resolve as planned, with Natalie even offering a few hopeful observations about the merits of self-worth. You can almost hear the Stones singing: “You can’t always get what you want… But if you try sometime, you find you get what you need.”.

“Isn’t It Romantic” opened to outsized expectations and stranger-than-fiction real-life parallels. After shooting for the movie concluded, Chopra married Nick Jonas and Hemsworth tied the knot with Miley Cyrus. This doesn’t mean that “Isn’t It Romantic” is the “Citizen Kane” of romantic comedies. But it is a clever, fun self-aware film, with a few laugh-out-loud moments, that navigates a formulaic landscape with a knowing wink and a nod.