Mark Pfeiffer
Screenwriter
- Joined
- Jun 27, 1999
- Messages
- 1,339
Well, they can't say that the trailer is false advertising. The trailer made me want to puke; I thought the film looked that bad based upon it.
Still, I had managed to avoid it since Hearts in Atlantis, and there's always hope that the film about to unspool before you will be entertaining.
I don't judge based on preconceptions (as, for example, I'm embarrassed to admit that I sort of liked On the Line--yes, the movie with a couple of the guys from N Sync. It works better than Serendipity at a similar premise, but that's something altogether different). So I had an open mind when I went to see it this morning...
What an awful piece of tripe. My best guess is that this is supposed to be Drew Barrymore's "serious" film to get her name mentioned as an Oscar contender. I've liked what she's done in her "comeback" (Home Fries, Ever After, Never Been Kissed, and yes Charlie's Angels), but yow, this is a miss by a continent.
The film is based on a true story (and adapted from a book). Barrymore is Beverly D'Onofrio, a smart teenager who gets pregnant at 15. Her best friend also is pregnant, which gives her someone to experience the trials and tribulations with.
Beverly feels that she has been cheated in life. She may not go to college or go on to be some great writer. She seems to hold a grudge against her son because he has ruined her dreams.
This gets precisely to one of the major problems with the films. Beverly is completely unsympathetic and unlikable. She is a bad mother. She is selfish, self-centered, and terribly immature. When the nurse brings her the baby and tells her its a boy, she insists she had a girl and doesn't really want to take him. This is played for laughs, but there's nothing remotely funny about it. Nearly every time Beverly gets a chance to redeem herself in the audience's eyes, she makes the wrong decision. Ha ha.
The whole sitcom-y approach is nauseating. The goofy comedy could have come straight from one of Barrymore's other films (although director Penny Marshall likely is to blame for some, if not most, of this). There's a scene where she dances for a son to a song about a dancing pig, and I thought, you know, her performance is like watching a dancing bear. Look at how silly she can be. Look at the unexpected things she does.
Barrymore can't be entirely at fault, and I'm sure she'll rebound from this disaster. While an occasional dramatic role isn't a bad choice, this was a case of being entirely wrong for the part or the part being entirely wrong regardless of who played it. (I tend to think the part would have been a failure for anyone, but Barrymore doesn't bring any gravitas or reality to it.) The facile emotions and hackneyed screenplay and direction don't help.
And I think it's a bad title too... D-
Still, I had managed to avoid it since Hearts in Atlantis, and there's always hope that the film about to unspool before you will be entertaining.
I don't judge based on preconceptions (as, for example, I'm embarrassed to admit that I sort of liked On the Line--yes, the movie with a couple of the guys from N Sync. It works better than Serendipity at a similar premise, but that's something altogether different). So I had an open mind when I went to see it this morning...
What an awful piece of tripe. My best guess is that this is supposed to be Drew Barrymore's "serious" film to get her name mentioned as an Oscar contender. I've liked what she's done in her "comeback" (Home Fries, Ever After, Never Been Kissed, and yes Charlie's Angels), but yow, this is a miss by a continent.
The film is based on a true story (and adapted from a book). Barrymore is Beverly D'Onofrio, a smart teenager who gets pregnant at 15. Her best friend also is pregnant, which gives her someone to experience the trials and tribulations with.
Beverly feels that she has been cheated in life. She may not go to college or go on to be some great writer. She seems to hold a grudge against her son because he has ruined her dreams.
This gets precisely to one of the major problems with the films. Beverly is completely unsympathetic and unlikable. She is a bad mother. She is selfish, self-centered, and terribly immature. When the nurse brings her the baby and tells her its a boy, she insists she had a girl and doesn't really want to take him. This is played for laughs, but there's nothing remotely funny about it. Nearly every time Beverly gets a chance to redeem herself in the audience's eyes, she makes the wrong decision. Ha ha.
The whole sitcom-y approach is nauseating. The goofy comedy could have come straight from one of Barrymore's other films (although director Penny Marshall likely is to blame for some, if not most, of this). There's a scene where she dances for a son to a song about a dancing pig, and I thought, you know, her performance is like watching a dancing bear. Look at how silly she can be. Look at the unexpected things she does.
Barrymore can't be entirely at fault, and I'm sure she'll rebound from this disaster. While an occasional dramatic role isn't a bad choice, this was a case of being entirely wrong for the part or the part being entirely wrong regardless of who played it. (I tend to think the part would have been a failure for anyone, but Barrymore doesn't bring any gravitas or reality to it.) The facile emotions and hackneyed screenplay and direction don't help.
And I think it's a bad title too... D-
