brian_dines

18 May 2012

Yeah, this movie blows, but theres something interesting to see

No question, this was a dog of a movie from the outset, the verypremise wreaking of schlock, but whenever you get of these ensemblecasts together it's interesting to compare what each of the actorsbrings to the screen. In particular, how often are you going to getJessica Alba, Jessica Biel, Jennifer Garner and Anne Hathaway togetherin the same movie? With the four leading ladies, I think you've really got two differentgroups: the two Jessicas are known more for "serious" roles rather thancomedy, and there's a pretty good reason for that: neither are funny.There are a couple of scene where Biel and Garner share the screen fora few seconds, and Garner's enormous charisma and humor dominates thescene, though I'm sure unintentionally. Garner can't help be but funny.It has to be said that Jessica Alba is the worst actress on the planetand it shows clearly in this film. She is painful to watch. The womanhas got to take some acting lessons and get out of her head; she maywell be the re-incarnation of Natalie Wood. Biel is much better andhonest.So that leaves the two comic actors, Anne Hathaway and Jennifer Garner.Garner is just mesmerizing to watch as all that energy and enthusiasmexplodes like an over-full can of whipped cream on the camera lens.Hathaway is exactly the opposite. You get the sense from this film,more from other films, that Hathaway is deliberately holding somethingback, dishing out her intensity in metered amounts. They're both arefunny, but you get the impression that Hathaway's performance is athoughtful bit of acting, while Garner is just cranking out anotherfunny performance. Watching these two reminds me of watching John Wayneand Henry Fonda: both did Westerns, but you never forgot you werewatching John Wayne while Henry Fonda got lost in his roles. Hathawayis Henry Fonda and Garner is John Wayne, but I think in today's world,Hathaway will have the longer and stronger career. Anyone wanting to see a good performance from Hathaway should see "Loveand other Drugs", which she's absolute great in.

18 May 2012

Fluffy and Lightweight Star Studded Movie with Very Little Substance

This was a cute movie and quite entertaining for when you are bored and just want to watch something to take your mind off. However, I must admit that if it hadn't been filled with a star-studded cast, it would be really boring and pretty bad actually. In fact, the one thing that made this movie semi bearable was the fact that nearly every scene had an important, often high-caliber star hidden in there somewhere and half of the fun of this movie was pointing out the stars - like "oh, there is Brad Cooper" or "Wow, Jessica Biehl" and "Hey, this is Kathy Bates." This movie is about the lives of about half a dozen couples or so and some lonely souls in between in the span of roughly twenty-four hours during Valentine's Day. In the end, all their stories interconnect. Most of it is pretty predictable and right on formula and as I write, I must admit that the most fun really in this movie was pointing out the stars part and seeing what they are up to. There are comatosely, slow moments - like the story line about that old couple played by Shirley MacClaine and Hector Elizondo. Sorry, didn't care hearing about their WWII romance and how she cheated on him like 50 years ago. Whatever. The other part I fast forwarded through was all the juvenile, silly parts with Taylor Lautner and Taylor Swift (haha - how cute - yes we get it - both are named "Taylor" - very clever) whose idea of romance is planning on having sex during lunch time "because it is the only time we got today." Taylor Swift cannot act and is dumb like a rock and appears ot be playing herself mainly. The scenes with her are cringe-worthy and I must say - never having paid any attention to her face before really - I realized how much she looks like a cross between a rat and a pig and just weird. Anyway, the "high schooler" segment just didn't seem to fit the theme and pace of the rest of the movie and it was obvious she got the part not because of her acting skills (she has none), but because of her name. In fact, having a big name seems to have the prerequisite for being signed on to this movie. Having said that, I believe one of the huge issues with this film is in fact that it is filled left and right with a star-studded cast; packed in fact. While entertaining from a fun perspective as mentioned above, it was pretty bad from a narrative, acting, character-development and substance angle. I mean they had these stars - some of whom are amazing actors - packed into this meaningless, superficial patchwork of a movie, totally underutilizing them (I dont think anyone had more than three minutes of screen time per scene) - eventually leading to a watered-down story and equally watered down characters. This is a perfect example of why quantity doesn't necessarily equal quality - as this was just overkill. And is ultimately this overkill that did not allow the individual talents and strengths of each actor to shine through. Jessica Alba, aside from looking washed out from that awful blonde hair, had a total of five minutes of screen-time and the story of her, Ashton Kutcher and Jennifer Garner seemed wrapped up "too quickly". Overall, they just stuffed too many story lines and too many issues and conflicts in there for any single one of them to be satisfactorily resolved or even meditated on and fleshed out. It was an assembly line "check and go". There was also a lot of not so subtle product placement in this movie and overall it seemed all a little bit too much like a promotion for Valentine' Day - sort of as if the industry got together and thought of a way to make a two hour, star cast commercial to somehow revive the holiday. That is, I guess, why nearly all actors are either high profile, established ones or otherwise big names (Lautner from the Twilight movies and Swift the mega country music star etc.). I wonder why any of them signed up for this piece of tourist trinket in the first place and how the studio could afford them all. I hear Roberts gets paid something like 20 million per movie and all other actors are well established enough, so their salaries lie in the millions as well. This wasn't a cheap and I assume the only way they could afford it was all that product placement. Emma Roberts obviously got the part because of her aunt Julia Roberts - no question about it. In the end you had a lot of loose ends, many superficial endings, unbelievable and unauthentic human relationships and interactions and just not much substance but instead lots of frosting in the from of super stars. If you are looking for a sensitive, intelligent and somewhat meaningful story, you will be disappointed. But ifyou look ot fill your time with mindless banter, go for it.

Michael Phillips

16 May 2012

Is Valentine's Day good? Not really, though plenty of the actors are.

hrigby_houston1

16 May 2012

We were pleasantly surprised!

My husband and I loved this movie! We had expected it to be so/so inkeeping with the reviews on this site. On the contrary, we found itfunny, fresh, with a few twists we did not see coming...(and we are thepeople we figured out Sixth Sense 5 minutes into the movie!)Valentine's Day is a feel-good movie...and in this day and time, justwhat we needed. We easily kept up with the many characters, it wascleverly written, visually pleasing, Taylor Swift was hilarious, whoknew? The clever connections with Shirley McClaine and Julia Roberts,wonderfully done...and wait and see, this movie will take off by wordof mouth...we found it wonderful! We were in the theater with people ofall ages...people laughed and several were even weepy at the end. It isa little jewel box of a film! Go see it!

tintosecco

06 May 2012

Congratulations for this work, you all!

This movie surprised me. I understand that if is for the Valentine'sDay, should pleased everyone, OK, but in mine point of view, it was sowell written and so close to a anachronistic kind of history, gatheringaround different 'common' people, that it made a unique commercialmovie. And this is the why i congratulate the writer, the studio, andthe many great actors that were involved in this work. We can agreethat we don't see this every day, the simplicity of showing howdifficult it is to find The One that will be by your side every singleday of your life, by your choice, sometimes it seems to be so far way,that none of us can accept it. It's my first review, i can assure thisis just the beginning, i have so much to say about this art until nowcalled the 7th one

robcucchiaro

06 May 2012

Low expectations going in and still disappointed....

Trapped on an 11 hour flight with nothing better to do and I stillcouldn't get through this entire movie without turning it off. Thismovie is beyond awful, its painful. Who needs water boarding, show thismovie to terrorists and promise to turn it off if they supply usefulinformation to us. I can only wonder why a cast of such stars would allagree to shoot a movie without having read the script beforehand.Ashton Kutcher was especially unwatchable. This movie was so bad andyet had so many good actors that I thought it was Ocean's 14 for aminute. The movie was free and I still want my money back. At leastJamie Fox was good.

Grant Rollings

05 May 2012

This star-studded effort has all the romantic sincerity of an emailed Valentine with an off-the-shelf message.

illy-6

05 May 2012

so many actresses looked the same.. .like mini Julia Robertss!!!

OK so i am not too young and hip enough to recognize many of these new,generic, 'Gen Y' actors both male and female, but all the actresses inthis movie looked the same. they all had the same facial features asJulia Roberts. Long faces, long noses, big teeth, and wavy long brownhair. Maybe they all go to the same surgery in L.A. to get the requiredHollywood cosmetic work done. All they needed to add was Sarah JessicaPaker and you would have the Kentucky derby!!I watched this on a plane as an in flight movie and i preferred to turnit off and stare at the back of the seat in front of me than watch thisdrivel. The only time i remember doing that to a movie was for "BadGirls" many years ago which was another movie full of, at that time,big stars but with an terrible storyline and no appeal whatsoever.

ecbarth

02 May 2012

Went in expecting the worst

I went into this movie thinking it was just a juggernaut of a castbrought together purely to throw together a film to capitalize on V-daybut i ate my words after watching it.The movie is lovey-dubby to say the least but keeps track of each storyarch very well and the twists that weave them all together are a lotbetter than you'd expect. The ensemble cast really shines in this lightromantic movie, especially Ashton Kutcher, whose been absent from thelimelight for a bit, makes a pleasant return as the florist who is asmuch of romantic as they come, and George Lopez is also great in hisrole of the family man with all the right views on love.This review would go on forever if I broke down the whole cast but theyall play their parts very well and portray the many types of love yousee, young love, mature love, new relationships, and the also the typeof love for someone you didn't realize you had. Love story as it may beits very entertaining and greatly portrays the randomness of love andhow in its truest form is more important than anything else.I don't make a habit of seeing chick flicks and had this movie shotdown before I even saw it and was joking the whole time before how itwould be awful, but here Im willing to say I judged to soon. I give themovie 3 out of four stars

Rick Groen

01 May 2012

The film may be set in L.A., but no scene lasts longer than a New York minute.

Mark Braun

30 April 2012

Valentines Day 23 actors, zero stars

Ever sat through 120 minutes of Tasters Choice commercials in a row?WE bought the VIP seating and dinner for this god-awful mess. Startedat 7:18 and when I checked my watch at 8:30, my wife asked me how longit was. "2 hours, 23 minutes" I said. She was not amused... and neitherwere the couple of couples who existed at 9 pm in front of us. Tepid, shop-worn cuts of lives that criss-cross each other, this workedfor Altman much of the time but not here. Titles ran for way, way toolong and cardboard direction (i.e. silent people holding conversationsbehind actors) was too dumb to be believed. The humor was lightweightwhen it happened at all, and we, the audience always felt like there'sgot to be a payoff somewhere. Editing was sloppy when not entirelyflat. It was as if we'd just missed the direction: "aaaand walk," overand over again.I have a rule that only a true piece of junk uses gag reels for endtitles, and sadly, this did, too. In fact, the best line in the filmwasn't really in the film at all, but out of Julia Roberts' mouth asreference to PRETTY WOMAN which was a gem. If anything, this stands asa mess worthy f $1 rental just to see how bad it can get.

Edward Douglas

30 April 2012

Any potential for depth or intelligence has been sucked out by the very holiday the film attempts to glorify. The two hours watching this movie was no fairy tale.

30 April 2012

Mindless and fun but a bit overwhelming...

I'm a fan of romantic comedies. I admit it. It doesn't usually matter how dopey they are, they allow me to escape for just a little while. Valentine's Day pretty much falls in that category. It has a slew of fabulous actors (Ashton Kutcher, Bradley Cooper, Hector Elizondo, Shirley MacLaine, Topher Grace, Anne Hathaway, -Julia Roberts, just to name a few!), not to mention some ass-kickin' women - Jennifer Garner (my hero), Jessica Biel, and Jessica Alba. Seeing all these gorgeous people fumble through the "most romantic day of the year" is a bit amusing, but some characters with true potential don't have time to truly develop.All of the cliches are there - strangers striking up a conversation on a plane, best friends who don't realize they're truly in love, an older and happily married couple is tested by an awful secret. That being said, probably the sweetest story is between a military mother who has been overseas for 11 months and her son. When they are finally reunited at the end of the flick, I cried like a baby.

heehawchoke

29 April 2012

For parents (heads up on iff-eee parts)

Really Good movie! I loved the ending. My 11 year old sister watched itwith me and my friend and her older sister who is 18. We all loved themovie, though my 11 year old sister got a little embarrassed about thetiny little mention of sex, but honestly, its only a little bit and therest of us found it humorous. So, for all and any parents... Two of themain characters are planning to have sex at lunch while the parents areaway at work, mom comes home when only the boyfriend is at thegirlfriends house sees him naked, (they don't show any parts 8)!!!!)and he runs out of the house runs into the girlfriend while runningdown the street naked see is on her way to house to have sex. It isreally funny. The only other kinda weird part is that one of the othergirls is broke that the only job she could find that pays good andkeeps her like not having to do sex or be a stripper is to be a adultphone entertainer where she says all the naughty things she'll do toyour body when you call in. Really good movie.I think its good for11-any age.

femaleanimefan

27 April 2012

Not that bad, but definitely not a must see

I hate romantic comedies, so I didn't have high hopes for this movie.The reviews were bad, the trailer didn't look promising, so I went inexpecting to hate it.I didn't. But I didn't like it too much either. It had a few sweetmoments, a few mildly funny moments, but it ultimately was toopredictable and had too many stars. I could tell what was going tohappen in every storyline. Nothing surprised me. There was nothing newor fresh, which I expected.The actors are, honestly, mostly charming in their roles, but aren'tgiven enough screen time to build on that charm. They are allgood-looking, likable performers, but they are given absolutely nothingto work with. I would say the best performance would have to go toJennifer Garner, who has a few funny moments but a completelyuninteresting storyline. The worst would definitely have to be TaylorSwift. I don't hate the girl, but even playing an airhead bimbo, she isawful. She completely overacts, and I didn't laugh once. Taylor Lautnerisn't too bad, he at least pokes fun at himself but he is still prettystiff. There are tons of other stars who turn in admirable work (Iparticularly enjoyed the Bradley Cooper and Julia Roberts scenes), butare otherwise wasted. But Jessica Alba, who is top-billed, is only inabout four scenes! She isn't even the greatest actress, but she hadabsolutely nothing to do.If you want a good date movie, I don't recommend this one. It isdefinitely an inferior version of the imperfect but ultimatelyheartfelt Love, Actually. While it wasn't as horrible as I thought itwould be, the script is too weak and there are too many story lines. Isay skip it.

27 April 2012

Lovely!

With such a good cast, there were going to be some highlights and lowlights with this movie:- Fun. Lots of different stories to keep your engaged or interested. Some will spark interest, some will not.- Cute. The endings were nicely crafted to give you warm feelings of love.- Actor/actress performance were collectively good, but with a few rotten tomatoes. I will say that most of individuals involved in the cast did a good job. However, there were a few that just left a bad taste in my mouth. They contributed almost absolutely nothing to the movie.Solid love movie with a few flaws. Bearable though. Watch with your family, significant other, and friends

jshadle0807

26 April 2012

Take It For What It Is

The second you heard Taylor Swift and George Lopez were in the cast,you should have known that it was going to be one of those films. One,Taylor Swift is not even an actress so you knew they just wanted moremoney and two, well . . . it's George Lopez. Yeah . . .Yes there are way too many plots and yes there are way too many peoplebut you knew that when you went in. So let's drop it, huh? I didn'tthink the dialogue was THAT bad. Was the banter great like SherlockHolmes? Were there any quotable lines? No, not at all but it certainlywasn't as bad as any Disney movie.However, there were some surprises. The Julia Roberts story wasbeautiful, don't lie. And someone tell me that they were surprised atwho Eric Dane's lover turned out to be! And Queen Latifah made my daywhen she took over Anne Hathaway's job for a bit.Several of the couples had good chemistry. Such as Topher Grace andAnne Hathaway, Shirley MacLaine and Hecter Elizondo, Ashton Kutcher andhis 'surprise' partner are okay but not fabulous, Kathy Bates and JamieFoxx (not lovers) are great for the five seconds they're together, andTaylor Lautner and Taylor Swift were kinda cute in their own way.I left certain people out on purpose.On the other hand, I had some major issues with this film. One, howdare they use Kathy Bates for less than five minutes? She is betterthan that. Two, Jessica Biel... put your tail between your legs becausethat was a complete and utter epic FAIL. Three, what was the point ofthe Taylor/Taylor plot? It wasn't even funny and didn't move with therest of the movie. At least the other plots had some potential.No, it wasn't Love Actually and even for someone who has never seenLove Actually, it really wasn't all that great. It was cute though andif you're in the mood for something cute, Valentine's Day will do it.6/10 just cause I'm in a good mood.

Bruce Bennett

26 April 2012

No doubt the filmmaker's intentions were to serve up a tasty sampler platter while understanding that the cinematic equivalent of candy hearts could never make for a fully satisfying main course

Lou Lumenick

23 April 2012

Less funny or romantic than your average colonoscopy, this cringe-inducing bore provides dubious employment for four Oscar winners, two nominees and a raft of TV performers such as George Lopez, all of whom have been seen to better advantage elsewhere.

Diana Saenger

23 April 2012

A good date movie with more stars than script appeal.