My Best Friend's Girl
2008
I was disappointed in this Dane Cook comedy.
I know what you're thinking. How can anyone be disappointed in Dane
Cook, given the realistically pessimistic expectations engendered by the
fact that ... well, the fact that he's Dane Cook.
I'm not unaware of his tics and peculiarities, and I know he's not the
most subtle guy in the world, but I thought this was an excellent vehicle
for him. Here's the set-up: guys hire him to date women who have recently
dumped them. The women really want to get back in the dating scene and see
what they have been missing, but one date with Dane is a splash of cold
water to their faces - a reminder of just how ugly that whole scene can
be. Maybe that would be true even if Dane were just being himself, but in
this case, he is deliberately acting like the date from hell, because
that's what's necessary to drive the women immediately back to the guys
who hired Dane. In one short night, he reminds them of every single thing
that can go wrong on a date with somebody new, and forces them to realize
how good it is to have someone safe, even if they are a little boring or
unpolished.
You would think that a good comedy writer should be able to hit that
right out of the ballpark. It's batting practice. All they have to do is
think of dozens of funny, creepy things for Dane to do. I'll bet every
good-looking woman in the world has a dozen real stories which could be
used for this purpose with only slight exaggeration.
The writers did come up with a couple of funny scenes. In one, Dane is
the wedding date, and the bride is his date's sister. Dane goes up to
their mother and tells her that she must have been a hot slice of
fuckberry pie in her day, then takes down his pants, sticks his dick in
her face and says, "Well, c'mon, mom, it's not going to suck itself."
That's a few minutes after he asks to cut in when the bride and groom are
having their first dance. OK, that's all over the top, but it's outrageous
enough to get a laugh. In another case, Dane takes a devote Christian girl
to a tragically hip pizza parlor called Cheesus Crust, where the pizzas
are all in the shape of crosses and each order has a tastelessly catchy
name calculated to offend religious people by making light of Christ's
suffering. Not a bad comedy idea. At least it showed some creativity in matching
Dane's boorishness to the specific characteristics of the woman he was
hired to offend, and somebody went to a lot of trouble to create a
gigantic mural of the disciples and Jesus eating pizza at the last supper. There were also some funny scenes between Dane and Alec
Baldwin as the sleazy father who taught Dane everything he needed to
know about acting like an asshole.
For the most part, however, the dates from hell just weren't that
imaginative to begin with, and the rest of the film was dragged to a
standstill by the two serious Kate Hudson love stories which were driving
the plot. The romances ended up shoehorning the promisingly dark premise
into the shopworn romantic comedy template. The forced happy ending and
obligatory character redemption lacks any credibility because we have not
been given permission to like Dane's character or to want him to be
redeemed. Elsewhere in the film, the scenes with Jason Biggs, as the
schmuck whose unrequited love is the story's focal point, are
embarrassingly unfunny. Biggs infuses his role with plenty of energy, but
the ol' college try just isn't enough because the material is trite and
boring.
Because this movie has a few laugh-out-loud moments, it isn't as bad a
comedy as the IMDB rating (5.0) might lead you to believe, but the batting
practice premise should have resulted in a thunderous McGwire homer and
instead just delivered a fly ball to the warning track that got the crowd
to its feet, but ultimately disappointed. You'll probably walk out of the
theater liking the film this might have been if it had the courage to
stray from the usual tedious Kate Hudson romcom formula.
Strippers provided the
only real female nudity.
Kate Hudson is in a bra and panties
during her sex scenes,
but hey, it's Kate Hudson.