Review of Valentine's Day (2010) by Bernard L — 17 Jan 2012

Valentine's Day: a day we "love," a day we hate, and a day that one way or another makes us crazy. The film by the same name (2010) ensures its audience receives a dose of all three, but not without wrapping it up with a tidy happy ending. From the moment I saw the trailer for this film I immediately pegged it in my mind "Americanized Love Actually (2006)" based on the multi-plot but "cleverly" intertwined story lines demonstrating 6 degrees of separation, the all famous American cast with a handful of unknowns for good measure, and the fact that it takes place around a holiday.

And I was right. They tried to do Love Actually, and the film had its moments in the reveals that weren't clichà(C), the boy and who his crush is, the sports star and who his boyfriend is, or the son and who his mom is. I was sincerely surprised at each reveal, and the last one was the most touching; it almost earned a tear. Almost. For each of these refreshing moments there were about a dozen stale predictable moments, from the best friends with their significant others who realize "maybe we should be together," to the intense epiphanies that occurs to each character once that causes them to do a 180 and finish his or her plot line the way the audience wants. So what's Hollywood teaching us? That everything ends the way you want it toââ,¬Â¦good lessonââ,¬â?not.

The film was advertised as being directed by the director of Pretty Woman (1990), but honestly I would've been more excited if it was written by J.F Lawton, the writer of Pretty Woman; the story might've been better. No one advertises V Day as written by Katherine Fugate the woman who wrote The Prince & Me (2004), because if I'd known such a thing before watching, I would've been turned off instantly. The Prince & Me being the most hypocritical romantic comedy I've ever seen, since Julia Stiles throws away all her life long dreams and everything she is just to marry some guy she met ten minutes ago and becomes a princess. Her actions teach women to what? Forget ambition, but only for your honey? Thankfully Fugate doesn't make as big a faux pas in this film, throwing in fresher tidbits such as the occupation of phone sex operator and strangers on an airplane.

There's a clash of pushing forward and staying in the same place. We're led to believe Hollywood is progressing, presenting two guys in a relationship, but they're on screen together briefly and I guess there can't be kiss or any suggestive touching because then people might think they're gay! Wouldn't want to make any homophobes a little queasy with a simple peck on the lips or anything. Then there's the presentation of the women characters, which surprises me as the writer is a woman. We have the best friend woman whose male best friend rescues her, we have the weepy woman who hates V day but really just wants a man, the pretty high school girl always making out with boyfriend, smart girl who wants sex with boyfriend then decides to wait, and woman hiding her second profession from her beginner boyfriend. The only woman who is portrayed as independent and self-reliant is the "bad guy" in one of the relationships because she decides she's not ready and still needs to explore herself more. All the other women suffer the clichÃÂ (C)s of dependence, weakness, over emotional, etc. without demonstrating any inner ability to be strong because they have a man nearby.

V Day does not even come close to matching the endearment and goodness of Love Actually, which stays true to its name in portraying relationships in their awkwardness, difficulties, and failures of love and friendship. Not everyone is paired up at the end and some of them are characters I wanted to get together. Valentine's Day is the opposite, in which only the people who "wronged" a main character in love ended up loveless while everyone else gets a special someone. There are laughs on top of the staleness, and the reveals are somewhat worth it, but if you want a romantic comedy to move you, to identify with then Love Actually is the way to go. Us Americans always steal good ideas from the British, only this time we didn't improve it or keep it the same. We made it much worse.